An inside story at the Arts Council: Three and a half months after the fracture at the Arts Council, the abandonment of the Arts Plan and Patricia Quinn's resignation, and there is a new director in place.
Those in the know were tight-lipped about who had applied and those not in the know speculated about who would be willing to go for what some perceive as a poisoned chalice, with the treatment of Quinn hardly a come-on for a new director.
The in-house appointment of Mary Cloake is an advantage from the point of view of both the Arts Council and its clients - not to mention that of Cloake: there is continuity, she is on the inside and knows what she is taking on, and she knows what makes the council tick.
Cloake is generally well liked and well regarded. Commenting this week, Declan Gorman of Upstate Theatre in Dundalk, who has worked with her in the past, said "I think she's a tremendous appointment. She brings a huge amount of knowledge and also sensitivity; she has a deep understanding of the world of an artist".
Gerry Godley of Improvised Music Company said "she comes across as an honest broker, compassionate and fair, practical in her dealings". As a long-standing in-house appointment she will be a boon in getting staff firing on all cylinders.
Godley sounded a note of caution, however. "I would like to have seen some lateral thinking, to bring in fresh thinking around the council's role as a conduit between artists and their public." And he is concerned about Ireland becoming "culturally sedentary".
Cloake has been development director since 1997 and was aligned with the changing structure of the Council which Quinn headed. She has a quiet style, and there have been no public pronouncements on where she now stands on the various changes in style and vision of the Arts Council. The council's statement this week said it looked forward to "working closely with her in the exciting times ahead", and certainly this new council seems to have a much more hands-on role, and very clear ideas about its direction.
There is a division of opinion about whether the council's problem is what is seen as an obsession with administration and professionalisation to the detriment of creativity, or that it has just been spectacularly bad at communicating its message, and in its daily dealings.
Olive Braiden commented this week that she felt there would be a sea change in the way the council communicates. We've heard similar before. Watch that space.
Meantime, this is the first to be filled of the high-profile arts jobs up for grabs at the moment - including the directors of the Dublin Theatre Festival, Dublin Fringe and St Patrick's Festival, as well as whispers about the possibilities of another festival and of a theatre opening.
Cork 2005 outdoors
The Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, began the countdown to Cork's designation as European Capital of Culture in Dublin this week, writes Mary Leland.
Winding down the Irish presidency of the EU, he noted that Cork 2005 provided an opportunity "to celebrate our unique creativity and to continue strengthening our relationship with Europe by showcasing the best of our own and European culture and arts."
Earlier, in Cork, 2005 director John Kennedy introduced the European creators of one of the year's most important theatrical strands - three visiting companies which, with the city's own Corcadorca, will present a series of outdoor events under the title "Relocations". The four groups met to investigate possible sites, including the splendidly restored star-shaped Elizabeth Fort which will host a multi-media Shakespearean presentation What Bloody Man is That? by Teatr Biuro Podrozy of Poland.
Compagnie Jo Bithume from France will mount a version of the Frankenstein story in the long, lush, riverside Lee Fields, Corcadorca is to present a promenade production of The Merchant of Venice in the refurbished Courthouse and environs, while Scotland's Grid Iron is still looking for a space.
Indeed, one of the difficulties currently faced by Cork 2005 is a shortage of venues; this will have to be addressed if the promise of a new project every two and a half days and more than 5,000 events scheduled throughout the city during the year is to be realised.
Pat Kiernan of Corcadorca said the Relocation project would have been impossible without the help of Cork 2005 and, endorsing its welcome, Kennedy said the proposal offered an extraordinarily impressive three-month period of activity around the city next summer and deserved to be in the programme of any Capital of Culture.
Before going off to the launch of the Eurochild project for 2005 - a change, he said, from the sublime to the ridiculous - he added that what he especially admired about Corcadorca was their courage, their grit and their imagination, along with their ability to "put up with our bamboozlement" and their willingness to fly Ryanair without complaint.
London loves McPherson
Conor McPherson's latest play has been attracting plaudits from London critics. Shining City, which McPherson also directs, is a Gate Theatre/Royal Court co-production, due in Dublin during the Dublin Theatre Festival in September.
Charles Spenser in the Daily Telegraph calls McPherson " the finest dramatist of his generation" and goes on to say that it would be "a long time" before he would forget aspects of Stanley Townsend's central performance. Echoing this praise for Townsend - who has not been seen on a Dublin stage for some time - Kate Basset in the Independent on Sunday describes his performance in "Conor McPherson's riveting new play" as "extraordinarily gripping" and a London Times review said the actor "has never been better". MacPherson is even compared to David Mamet in the Sunday Telegraph review: "the fragmented dialogue is often as good" as that of the American dramatist.
Townsend plays John, a small-time businessman, who moves out of the family home because it is haunted by his dead wife (the revenant seems to be a recurring motif in McPherson's work).
The play centres on John's encounters with a therapist played by Michael McElhatton.
All of this, according to Michael Billington in the Guardian allows McPherson to explore "his favourite theme of the rooted solitude of the Irish male". In the wake of such unanimously positive reviews, the run at London's Royal Court has been extended.
Irish critic at US institute
Irish Times dance critic Michael Seaver has been awarded a fellowship from the New York Times and is one of eight international dance critics chosen to work within the Institute of Dance Criticism at this year's American Dance Festival.
The National Endowment of the Arts is providing $1 million for the first two years of the programme of three institutes, which includes one for classical music and opera critics at Columbia University, and one for theatre critics at the University of Southern California.
"We consider this institute to be the most important of activities in communicating the value of dance to the greater community," said Charles L. Reinhart, director of the American Dance Festival. "After all, it is not easy to verbalise what is generally a nonverbal art form." The institute provides an antidote to the isolation in which most dance critics find themselves working, according to critic and historian Suzanne Carbonneau, who will co-ordinate the international participants. "It not only gives critics the opportunity to exchange ideas about dance writing but also, by virtue of its setting at the American Dance Festival, allow this to happen within an exciting dance environment," she says. New editor at Cork
The editorship of the Cork Literary Review has changed hands with the role passing from Sheila O'Hagen to Fred Johnston - and fair dues to the local publishers Bradshaw Books, for taking such a non-parochial approach: O'Hagen is Dublin based and Johnson is based in Galway, where he will welcome submissions of poetry or prose. He is looking for a varied a selection of work, essays, criticism and poetryand is "anxious too that new voices get heard". The range of writers and the diversity of prose contributions developed greatly during O'Hagen's tenure - as did the look and size of the annual magazine.
Contact Fred Johnston at 1, Carn Ard, Circular Road, Galway