Irish Arts Center programming for Spring 2024, just announced, includes the “probing, timely new work of political theater ‘Agreement,’ a beautiful new dance work from choreographer, director and performer Jean Butler, a residency of internationally acclaimed singer-songwriter Lisa Hannigan, a large-scale exhibition of works by Irish women visual artists, and more.”
The IAC announcement continued, “The opening of the New Irish Arts Center, a 21,700-square foot hub for the arts, in December 2021, culminated a more than a decade-long transformation of IAC into one of New York’s most beloved multidisciplinary cultural institutions on an intimate scale, an accomplishment achieved despite the profound disruption of the COVID pandemic arriving in the middle of construction.” (See irishartscenter.org for more information.) Throughout Spring 2024, recurring programs continue, such as “Muldoon’s Picnic," and much more besides. See here. For the headliners, read below.
‘Agreement,’ April 11-May 12
Following the success of the IAC 2023 presentation of the 1970s Belfast-set punk musical “Good Vibrations,” Lyric Theatre transports audiences to another charged Belfast milieu. The Irish Times in a five-star review called Owen McCafferty’s “Agreement” a “searing new play” and the Guardian said it “expertly conveys” the volatile four-day process of peace negotiations in Northern Ireland that culminated in the Good Friday Agreement.
‘What We Hold,’ Feb. 14-March 3
Jean Butler’s “What We Hold,” re-designed and re-staged for Irish Arts Center after its sold-out 2022 Dublin Theatre Festival premiere, was, the Irish Times said in another five-star review, an “astonishing dance work, a visual, aural, almost poetic performative archive of Irish step dance.” It breaks down the barriers of audience and stage, inviting those present on a physical, cultural and emotional journey through a collective history of Irishdance from Ireland and the diaspora.
‘Distillation,’ June 7-9
Multidisciplinary performance maker Luke Casserly and perfume artist Joan Woods collaborate in the Abbey Theatre and Solas Nua production “Distillation” to lead audiences on another kind of journey: into the Midlands bog Casserly grew up around through the vivid evocations of the olfactory.
Lisa Hannigan, March 21-23
Lisa Hannigan, who the Telegraph says “creates music that sneaks up and envelops listeners in cocoons of sound,” will be in residence this season to write new work and play a series of public concerts with backing artistsfrom Ireland and the U.S.
‘Reclaiming a Space,’ Jan. 29 to June 23.
For the duration of the season, IAC’s latest exhibition will showcase women artists whose work reclaims traditional physical and cultural spaces using abstract art. “Reclaiming a Space,” featuring Diana Copperwhite, Erin Lawlor, Helen O’Leary and Dannielle Tegeder, will be on view throughout the building from Jan. 29 to June 23. The four Irish and diaspora women artists explore notions of home, place and displacement, and identity through different media and styles within the practices of abstract art. Representing both the hard edged and the lyrical, and ranging from oil painting to sculpture, their work shines a light on the genre’s reclamation of physical and cultural spaces that historically have been occupied by more traditional forms within the canon.
‘If These Wigs Could Talk,’ June 13-23
If “Agreement” recreates the tense realm of international politics inside the theater, “Ireland’s undisputed queen of drag,” in the words of the New York Times, Panti Bliss explodes all formality in “If These Wigs Could Talk,” her hit show that sold out its run at the Abbey Theatre in 2022. New York Times called it “funny, moving, and personal.”
Oona Doherty, June 4–9
Outside of IAC’s own space, Belfast-raised choreographer Oona Doherty makes her Joyce Theatre debut with “Navy Blue,” a thrilling amalgamation of ensemble movement, spoken-word poetry and political candor. Set to an eclectic soundtrack of compositions by Sergeï Rachmaninoff and electronic music composer Jamie xx, the work traces a line from the past to the present while urgently appealing for societal change.
