Cultural buildings help in making cultural places, but they alone are not enough. Galway provides an interesting example of how the innate culture of a place can help make a vibrant and innovative place. City makers need to understand and foster that which is unique, not that which international gurus prescribe, if they want to make places that people will want to live, work and play in.
Galway took a deep breath at the start of July as it prepared to be the place where people can “get away from it all”. This month started with a film fleadh, and the city broadened the scope for a multitude of arts practices for the Galway International Arts Festival, which is now running, and will refocus on equine pursuits for a racing festival that will see the city on a wave (of creativity, expectation, outrageous hotel prices and alcohol) into August.
Galway wears it well. It ably carries the cultural weight of the nation. The expectation is that Galway will be Galway. A real capital of culture, regardless of its ill-fated tenure as European Capital of Culture in 2020. Galway carries this weight much easier in the unofficial capacity than it ever does in an official one.
Galway residents know this. Yet they also wonder about the national designation, especially when they know that the cultural infrastructure of the city is not one that would warrant the title. From an art gallery to a music school to a concert hall, the residents and culture makers of Galway know what is lacking.
Important, though, is the role that culture has played in the making of the city. While underserved by culture buildings, the history of the place makes it clear that culture is part of the foundations of most of the city centre. Consider Quay Street. Race week will see it jam-packed with thousands of people in all their finery. Forty years ago, it was a different story: derelict and forgotten. It took a Spanish street theatre, Els Comediants, in 1985 to get the people of Galway to see the potential. Decades before the likes of Richard Florida or Charles Landry (those gurus of urbanism) talked of culture-led regeneration, Galway had put it into practice, enlivening the previously derelict places that now act as the backdrop for tourist images beamed across the world.
What we have witnessed in Galway is art helping a place to articulate itself.
Over the course of the first weekend of Galway International Arts Festival, we at Urban Lab Galway, an urban futures research group, together with the university, invited the artist Luke Jerram to help bring attention to an urban quarter of enormous potential in Galway. Nun’s Island, adjacent to the city centre, is a part of the city built on a different culture. The story of Nuns Island does not chime with the stock narrative of the west of Ireland that abounds in travel guides and Instagram accounts. Nun’s Island was the beating industrial heart of the city, from the construction of the canal network (circa 1850s) to the middle of the last century. It was the site of rebellion and incarceration (housing Galway gaol on the site of what is now the cathedral). It is also a place of sanctuary — the Poor Clare nuns who give their name to the place have been resident there for over 300 years.
Many of the marquee buildings that dominate the skyline and house the history of the city’s industrial past are owned by the University of Galway. These buildings lie dormant, an anathema to the bustle and activity that once filled them. A “masterplan” has been developed, one that sees its future as a new district of innovation, where industry and academia come together in a shared space. Many similar ventures have been carried out in other cities, from Melbourne to Manchester. Our hope is that we can broaden the definition of innovation (placing an emphasis on social and cultural forms) and capitalise on the human scale of Galway to make these laudable missions more human-centric, reflecting the wishes of those who live there.
Urban Lab Galway brought Luke Jerram’s Mars to the street outside the disused Persse’s Distillery with the hope of starting a conversation. The eight-metre diameter rendition of Mars ties in with our considering of how we will inhabit places in the future. The goal is to bring people back to a place that the city has forgotten about, using artistic intervention to inspire thoughts and ideas as to what the future of that place might be. Via the use of augmented reality (AR) apps, traditional and innovative consultation (such as artist-led workshops considering the nature of habitation, participant-led and directed consultation), Urban Lab Galway is setting out to fire the imaginations of festival-goers. Galway can no longer afford to take its cultural moniker for granted. Serious thought and investment is needed to ensure that Galway can continue to be Galway.
Dr Pat Collins is a University of Galway lecturer in economic geography and member of Urban Lab Galway
