Network Cork November 2017 event - Walking on the Moon
If you can dream it, you can achieve it – you can even walk on the moon!
Are you following your dream? Working in your ideal job?
Dr Niamh Shaw is and we're delighted she'll be joining Network Cork in November to tell us how she's achieving her dream of going to space.
Dr Niamh Shaw, engineer, scientist & performer is passionate about awakening people’s curiosity, merging performance & theatre with communication, engineering, science, art, & technology. She is interested in pushing boundaries in telling the human story behind science, creating science events for family & arts audiences.
Since she was 8 years old, Niamh has wanted to go Space. But did very little about it for a very long time. In 2011, she decided to make her life an art experiment in exploring the pursuit of lifelong dreams, presenting her work in theatrical, and in other publicly engaged platforms. As part of this, Niamh plans to be a future space colonist, to contribute to human space exploration as artist and communicator. In this capacity as Astronaut-in-Training, she participated in a simulated Mars mission in January 2017. As the artist and journalist for Crew 173, she was part of a team of six international analogue astronauts at the Mars Desert Research Station in the Utah desert. She has just returned from the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Centre in Star City, Moscow. During her time there, she experienced a Zero gravity flight to explore weightlessness on Earth and the frailties of human in the extremes. She continues to plan her next analogue mission to extreme terrains on Earth and will participate in Project PoSSUM training in Florida next Spring. She was Core Lectures Associate Chair and lecturer at the International Space University’s 2017 annual Space Studies Programme in Cork, is an 2015 alumnus of this same programme and lectured in 2016 in Humanities department activities.
She is artist in residence at CIT Blackrock Castle Observatory, Cork. Her last STEAM theatre piece, 'To Space', toured internationally from 2014-16 & was supported by Culture Ireland, ESA and the Arts Council of Ireland. Her next theatre piece ‘Diary of a Martian Beekeeper’ funded under SFI's 2017 Discover programme, working closely with ESA’s Astronaut Centre in Cologne premiered last months as part of Space Week 2017 and will tour internationally in 2018. She is the Dublin point of contact for Space week Ireland & is Space Ambassador for ESA's education and resource office (ESERO UK). As alumnus of ISU's Space Studies Programme (SSP) 2015, she lectured on the Humanities programme of SSP 2016 & was Core Lectures Assoc Chair for SSP17 in Cork this summer. She recently returned from a simulated Mars mission at MDRS in the Utah desert as Crew Artist and Journalist, bringing the ‘Stargazer Lottie’ doll with her to inspire the next generation to dream big.
Niamh is an advocate of ‘Women in STEM’, & was recently voted one of Ireland’s top 10 science communicators by Silicon Republic acknowledging her work in STEAM & contributions on national TV, radio, press & public speaking events incl. Inspire Fest 2017, TEDxUCD and the World Science Festival 2016. She brings her work to international arts and science festivals, including Cheltenham Science Festival, Edinburgh Fringe, Adelaide Fringe, Edinburgh International Science Festival and speaks with school, teachers, parents and all educational group to promote a multidisciplinary approach to learning. She writes for Headstuff online paper and BBC’s astronomy magazine ‘Sky at Night’. She co-founded STEAMakers.co & is a member of function(core), an international transdisciplinary problem-solving & ideation collective.
Niamh speaks on thought leadership & provides specialised communication workshops in the private sector & co-founded a new communications centre for academics in Ireland with UCD and the Tyndall Institute.
Niamh believes that we can be many things at the same time. She is curious always & embraces failure every day.
Tickets are free for Network Cork members, €25 for non-members. Advance booking required.
Please note this event will be on a Thursday instead of our usual Wednesday.
Date and Time
Thursday Nov 9, 2017
6:00 PM - 8:00 PM GMT
Thursday 9 November 2017 from 6–8 p.m.
Fees/Admission
Free for Network Cork members, €25 for non-members
Contact Information
If you have any queries, please email info@networkcork.com
Send Email
Printed courtesy of www.corkchamber.ie/ – Contact the Cork Chamber for more information.
Fitzgerald House, Co. Cork, T23 TD90 – 021 4509044 – info@corkchamber.ie