CORK TRAVELLER WOMEN'S NETWORK OFFICIALLY LAUNCH THEIR NEW PARTNERSHIP WITH TRISKEL ARTS CENTRE

Cork Traveller Women's Network officially launch their new partnership with Triskel Arts Centre at 11am Thursday 1 February. The CTWN Headquarters has taken up residency in the Triskel HUB on a three year lease. A morning of events including panel discussion and archive film screening will mark the event.
 
Bridgid Carmody, Cork Traveller Women's Network, Louise Harrington, Cork Traveller Women's Network, Tony Sheehan Artistic Director, Triskel Arts Centre and Sandra McCarthy Cork Traveller Women's Network who will launch their new partnership on 1 February 2018. Photo Credit: Ger McCarthy
 
Brigid Carmody, Co-ordinator at CTWN says "We are delighted to launch our partnership with Triskel Arts Centre. It is particularly significant for us that this has happened in the year following the national recognition of Traveller ethnicity by the Irish State. We hope that our work together will raise the positive profile of Travellers as citizens of Cork, as well as facilitate opportunities for Travellers to be involved in arts and culture”
 
This new partnership that will see the CTWN and Triskel working closely together to bring Traveller Culture into the mainstream of the Arts Centre’s Artistic Programme. This link was developed in response to the historic recognition of Traveller ethnicity by the government of Ireland on the in 2017.
 
On1 February’s launch event a special programme of archive footage ‘Travellers on Film’ will be presented by the Irish Film Institute on Triskel Christchurch’s cinema screen. The programme, which was co-curated by IFI and Minceirs Whiden, features a broad selection of footage of Irish Travellers from the 1940s to the present day and includes documentary films about Traveller funerals (1940s); Traveller crafts (1950s); Traveller nomadism; campaigns for Traveller rights; and contemporary Traveller culture. It also includes fictional representations of Travellers from the 1950s to the present day.
 
After the screening, a panel of Traveller leaders - Maria Joyce (National Traveller Women Forum), Kathleen Sherlock (Minceirs Whiden), Ann Burke (Southern Traveller Health Network) and Brigid Quilligan (Kerry Travellers Health & Community Development Project) - will lead a discussion on how Irish Travellers have been portrayed on film, has this played a part in the stereotyping of Irish Travellers, what if anything has changed over the years.  Active audience participation in this discussion is encouraged.
 
Triskel Arts Centre’s Artistic Director Tony Sheehan says “To have the headquarters of CTWN located at Triskel Arts Centre is a very significant development for both Organisations as Traveller Culture needs to amplified and supported in the cultural sector.  2018 is a landmark year for Triskel as we celebrate 40 years, and we look forward to the opportunities this new partnership will bring to Cultural Life in Cork.”