Open Circle Community Arts has been nominated for a Pride of Place award. The purpose of the competition is to acknowledge the work being done every day by communities all over the island of Ireland. Open Circle is delighted to be representing Kilkenny in the Creative Place category in the competition.
Open Circle Community Arts celebrated International Womans Day on 8th March 2018 with an Open House for the women of Kilkenny to drop in and meet other women at the Open Circle House in the city, for a creative morning of art activity, chat and refreshments.
We had a lovely group of women in for the morning, past and present members and some new faces. Following our papercutting workshops at the end of 2017 with Paul Bokslag we used the skills to make some small papercut work and turned them into cards.
Yvonne Craddock one of the current members of Open Circle then facilitated a Tai Chi & Qi Gong lunch time session at McDonagh Junction. It was a lovely introduction to this form of exercise /relaxation.
The celebrations continued in the afternoon with many past and present members of Open Circle meeting in the National Craft Gallery for a Crafternoon Tea session that included tote bag printing with Print Block Studio, and an opportunity to view the two wonderful jewellery exhibitions Rudolf Heltzel and Bounded + Unlimited.
Monica Hayes from KCLR visited Open Circle Arts earlier this month and spoke to some of the women who have been through the 12 month tutored programme at Open Circle and are now working independently at the house for 6 months. Here is the link to the show ‘The Diary’ which went out on Wednesday 21st February 2018 :-
https://kclr96fm.com/documentary/programme-4-open-circle-kilkenny/
2017 was a busy year at Open Circle Arts. Big thank you to all the women involved in the various projects through out the year, and to the artists who worked with the women facilitating a range of interesting and exciting workshops across the visual arts, creative writing and theatre. We would not be able to run this programme without funding and support from, Kilkenny Arts Office and the Kilkenny & Carlow ETB.
The large scale papercuts which two groups of women at Open Circle have been working on over the month of November have been finished and installed at the Goods Shed at MacDonagh Junction just in time for the opening of Yulefest 2017. The women worked with Artist Paul Bokslag, https://paulbokslag.com/ over several workshops at Open Circle House during the month of November and as well as learning about the art of papercuts, having fun and socialising they produced this stunning piece of work.
Our paper cuts workshops are progressing so well, really exciting work being made.
Our paper cuts workshops got off to a flying start this week on Thursday evening and Friday morning with both groups making beautiful work.
The Deadline for receipt of applications to Open Circle Arts for 2018 has been extended to close of business on Monday 13th November.
If you are interested in getting involved with Open Circle Arts, contact Sheila on 087 1355318 or email opencirclearts@gmail.com, you can have access to wonderful tutors and avail of the facilities and workshop, for example printing with Maeve Coulter from Blackstack Studios, here is a example the work made at the print workshops
Culture Night 2017 in Kilkenny was a huge success, we had a packed house at Open Circle with artist Paul Bokslag, for our fun and creative paper cuts workshops. The art of paper cutting is deeply rooted in folk culture and has evolved uniquely all over the world to adapt to different cultural styles. Paul guided the participants through the process of making a lantern using paper cutting techniques. No previous experience was necessary, all materials provided and everyone went home with a beautiful paper lantern and new skills to experiment with and share with family and friends.
