Archive | News
MP strives for HM Government to acknowledge forced repatriations
In Liverpool, many of us are aware of the forced repatriation of hundreds of Chinese seaman in the 1940s.
We have stumbled over community stories of families left behind. We have shaken our heads at the inconcievable and overt injustice of a governmental act that denied people their fathers, husbands and friends and we have empathised over the loss.…
#BlackLivesMatter: a collective reflection
Context
Liverpool Arts Regeneration Consortium (LARC) and Creative Organisations of Liverpool (COoL*) together represent over 30 cultural organisations in the City Region.
Both groups are committed to racial justice and to making meaningful change within their member organisations and in the work they do.…
#GlobalGreening 2021 and St Patrick’s Day
Each year, the Liverpool Irish Festival seeks the support of city centre and regional landmarks to turn emerald in honour of St Patrick’s Day.
#GlobalGreening was set up by Tourism Ireland and operates internationally. International sites have included: Sydney, Venice, Milan, Hong Kong and Washington DC -and many more- celebrating Irish communities across the world.…
Migrant exchanges
Over the years, the Liverpool Irish Festival has considered Irishness in terms of creative legacy and production. We have investigated Irishness via dual-heritage lives; the genetic make-up of the city; historic migration and contemporary identity theory (post-Brexit).
Though we have discussed migration and migrants a lot -including causes, diaspora groups and long-term effects- we have given less consideration to modern-day views of domestic migration, or how Irish migrancy is compared to other ‘transient’ communities.…
Ireland to Liverpool
The Festival has always dreamed of having its own theme song.
A tune that helps to tell our story; reflect our creativity and honour the people we serve. We thought we could use a song at the start of events -online and inperson; use it on adverts and mini-films we make for celebration days, and innumberable other occasions where we want to make an impression when a logo, banner or speech isn’t the right thing…
The right time, the right place
In December, we were alerted to a new fund; a Creative Community Fund (#CreativeCommunity), organised by the Government of Ireland.…
Is the Irish language alive in Liverpool?
Many of you will have read campaigns about the Irish Language Act in Northern Ireland and will have views on national languages being spoken at home and abroad. Language itself can be a contentious subject; politicised and exclusionary for some, but ‘mother languages’ often transport people to happy places; to a loved one’s voice and to connections not brought about by any other sound.…
Finding Bridget
Maz O’Connor came to the Festival’s attention in 2018 when she discovered and shared the history she had unearthed about her family’s Irish connections.
Those findings inspired her next album, Chosen Daughter and a feature we ran (article on page 24).…
Quarantine – a response
We began work with Alison Little in 2016 when we first launched our In:Visible Women programme. A Liverpool based artist, activist and educator, Alison’s work layers texture and printed evidence against abuse and empowerment.
Following on from the in memoriam work the Festival did with Eavan Boland’s poem Quarantine in 2020, Alison has created a visual response to this work.…
Retrospective future gazers
Sub-title: A quick, short, and linear exercise to map the Royal Charter’s failed-return to Liverpool against the history of weather forecasting.
<<<During lockdown, Derry-based Hong Konger, artist Edy Fung has used weather to help motivate her working cycles.
In doing so, she has studied meteorological history, finding links between Derry and Liverpool.…
Operation Nollaig community cards
Write your first Christmas card to a stranger…
The Liverpool Irish community has within it isolated members, who -particularly in lockdown- have few contacts or digital interactivity to rely on. Help us let them know they are being thought about this festive season by sending them a Christmas card using our CARA service.…
Lockdown Lights: A reading list
During lockdown we’ve kept chatting with Sefton Park Palm House, continuing from our fundraiser last year, through #GlobalGreening in March to today. Over that time, the Palm Readers group has taken on new meaning; connecting readers and friends and providing opportunities for people to escape in to other worlds via the book selections they make.…