ARTSCAPE: Earlier than ever this year, the Dublin Theatre Festival has announced highlights of its programme for the autumn and its plans to celebrate its 45th birthday. The onset of middle age has prompted some reflection on the festival's achievements and future direction. At the launch on Monday, director Fergus Linehan stressed the need for the festival to have an impact beyond the two hectic weeks in October, so that the annual feast of theatre wasn't followed by "starvation".
Nurturing new work from Irish playwrights and practitioners and forging collaborative links with companies abroad was now an important aim of the festival, he said. For this year's festival, three young Irish playwrights (unnamed so far) will translate the work of three young European playwrights and the results will be showcased in a season called "European Stages" over the closing weekend. There will also be masterclasses in acting, designing and producings.
Highlights of the programme include a new play by Marina Carr at the Abbey. Set in Carr's favoured locale, the midlands, Ariel will be directed by Conall Morrison and promises to be "an exploration of power and corruption in contemporary Irish society".
Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre Company makes its Irish début, bringing its renowned ensemble talents to bear on David Mamet's Glengarry Glen Ross. A double-bill, The Notebook and Proof, adapted from novels by Agota Kristof and produced by De Onderneming Theatre, was lauded at last year's Edinburgh Festival and will be staged at the Samuel Beckett Theatre. The plays are an evocation of Europe in the second World War, seen through the eyes of twin brothers.
Liberty Hall will become the festival's centre of operations, housing the box office, festival club, bookshop and press centre, as well as an exhibition documenting the festival's first 45 years. The festival will run from September 30th to October 12th. Information at www.dublintheatrefestival.com
A new Northern Irish literary journal is to be launched by Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, holder of the Ireland Chair of Poetry. Edited by Chris Agee of the Linenhall Library, Irish Pages is an illustrated bi-annual Belfast-based publication featuring fiction, poetry and non-fiction. Its aspiration is to "create a novel literary space in the North adequate to the unfolding cultural potential of the new political dispensation". The first issue is funded by Imagine Belfast, the organisation promoting Belfast's bid to be European City of Culture in 2008, and focuses on links between Belfast and Europe. Contributors include Seamus Heaney, Tom Paulin, Medb McGuckian and Eileen Battersby, with photographs by John Minahin. Irish Pages will be available in bookshops and by subscription and will be launched as part of Belfast's Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival at The Atrium, Clanmill House, Waring Street, on Thursday at 6.30 p.m.
The Chester Beatty Library, Irish Museum of Modern Art and Waterford Treasures are the first Irish museums to be shortlisted for the annual European Museums Awards. Winners will be announced in Luxembourg next Saturday by Queen Fabiola of Belgium. Sixty- one countries are eligible for the awards, now in their 25th year. Details at www.msim.org.uk