Pilot Mentoring Award: Recipients

Create is delighted to welcome the recipients of the Pilot Mentor Panel Award.  

This new award sits within a suite of offerings under the Artist in the Community (AIC) Scheme. It aims to offer capacity building and arts practice development for collaborative socially engaged artists, and artists who are transitioning into this field.  

Create pairs experienced artist mentors with awardees, to act as a critical friend/guide as mentees develop their projects. Over a three-month period, awardees will engage in dialogue with their mentors towards building key capacities, while interrogating and consolidating their collaborative socially engaged practice.  

Visual artist Tara Carroll will engage with mentor Aisling Byrne around ‘Art as Pilgrimage’, a project focusing on exploring histories of pilgrimage and their role in society, alongside centering issues of accessibility.  

Artist Niamh Gibbons will work with mentor Ruairí O’Donnabháin to develop the project ‘Ancestors Supper’, which engages with women from the Travelling Community to gather local knowledge, and raise awareness of food insecurity and environmental concerns.  

Artist Kasia Kaminska will work with mentor Deirdre O’Mahony on the development of GILD, an ongoing social art project which combines ecological art and gardening practices to connect people, plants and places. 

Dance artist and choreographer Yasmin Mello will work with mentor Feidlim Cannon on her project ‘Mobilise’ which is envisioned as an interdisciplinary collaborative work exploring themes of migration and myths, incorporating surreal imagery and intuitive creative processes.  

Artist Brigid Mulligan will work with mentor Jijo Sebastian around creating her first collaborative film as part of an ongoing project which engages members of the Freebirds Motorcycle Club on themes of loss and grieving.  

All mentors and mentees will explore central elements of collaborative socially engaged practice, including collaborative methodologies, outreach, sustaining relationships with communities, evaluation, and more. Create’s Pilot Mentoring Award is funded through the Artist in the Community Scheme (AIC), managed by Create on a devolved basis for the Arts Council.

The panel which awarded this award was chaired by Áine Crowley, Programme Manager Arts and Engagement, and consisted of Grace Wilentz, Mentor Panel Coordinator, Dana Olarescu, Independent Artist, and Anthony Haughey, Independent Artist and Lecturer at TU Dublin. Create staff member Jane O’Rourke observed and took minutes.