Creative Cavan 2025

Moving through and around

is an exhibition by Helena Hamilton, Aoife McGrath, Sorca McGrath, and Simon Mills in collaboration with 8 dancers working across the rural border regions of Cavan, Fermanagh-Omagh and Monaghan: Ruth Clarke, Marion Crowe, Jamie Fagan, Jessie Keenan, Tina McGurren, Rebeca Sanchez, Aysha Treanor, and Dylan Quinn.  Launched on Thursday 3 July 2025 the exhibition will run at Strule Arts until Saturday 26th July and will tour in a variety of locations throughout Ireland.

                        “…arms up, and swing”

The exhibition invites you to experience the diverse range of dance practiced in this border region through sculpture, sound, video, photography, drawings, and movement capture.

                         “…and sink and step”

Taking inspiration from the unique geological landscapes formed by the movement of water through and around rocks above and beneath the territorial border, the exhibition celebrates connections between people and place forged through dance; honouring embodied sharing of movement and cultures.

“                       …walk, walk, walk, turn”

From Sean-Nós, hip-hop, Flamenco and set dancing, to contemporary, Scottish Country, jiving and line-dancing, the exhibition shares personal, affective, interrelational, and location-specific experiences of dance connections that would not normally be recorded in mapping of dance on the island. It allows an alternative cartography and sensory landscape to emerge that offers new perspectives on how dance is practiced, shared, and valued.

                     “… back two three, touch”

Through a wide range of media, the exhibition allows your moves to join the dance through a visual, sonic and choreographic encounter with the steps, sounds, and significant sites for dance in this rural border region.

Dance Connects

This exhibition is part of the Dance Connects in Rural Border Regions project funded by Creative Ireland’s Creative Communities on a Shared Island scheme (Creative Ireland Programme, 2023-2027). Dance Connects (2024 – 2025) Led by Creative Cavan and Cavan Arts Office (Cavan County Council) dance connects partners with local authorities of Monaghan, and Fermanagh-Omagh with practitioners of diverse dance communities working in their border areas, and researchers Professor Aoife McGrath (School of Arts, English and Languages, QUB) and Dr Victoria Durrer (School of Art History and Cultural Policy, UCD).                                                                             

Exhibition Details

Dance Connects exhibited in Strule Arts in July 2025.  Further dates will be added shortly.

Link to Strule Arts Centre:  Moving Through and Around - Exhibition Launch - Strule Arts Centre