This Giant Tent: Celebrating Our Connections – the story so far!

This Giant Tent is building on a very special project developed in Ballina from 2018-19 by children from Involve Youth Project and Scoil Íosa, who created a book of the same name celebrating culture and identity, in collaboration with Kids’ Own Publishing Partnership and The National Museum of Ireland – Country Life.

To mark the Ballina 2023 celebrations, the project has been further developed into a public multicultural event rooted in community and celebration of both Traveller culture in Ballina, and of the myriad of cultures and communities that call Ballina home.

To date, This Giant Tent 2023 has been focused on research, and artist Alice Dixon has been working with The Traveller community and other communities in Ballina to develop work that is meaningful and allows for sustainability after the project has finished.

Organisational Partners, Kids Own Publishing, National Museum of Ireland, Turlough House and Involve Youth Project Ballina have committed time and support to the project, and the process to date has highlighted aspects that are unique to Ballina within the Traveller community in Ballina, that span over four generations of living history. For example, it has been identified that there are twelve families locally who have living great-grandparents  all of whom attended Scoil Croí Iosa.

To explore the theme of Celebrating our Connections, a series of workshops has taken place throughout the first half of 2023 in Scoil Íosa in close connection with Involve Youth Project, focusing on people, place and connection and a celebration of the rich diversity that exists in Scoil Íosa and the surrounding area.

The children and young people have used various artforms including portraits (of self and each other) exploring their own identities, what they like to do and their family backgrounds, focusing on that connect them with each other, and things that are unique about themselves and each other.

Objects have been brought into the classroom from National Museum of Ireland – Country Life connected to Traveller traditions and culture for the children to respond to. Similar to a show and tell experience, this is using creative methods to encourage sharing of stories about their families, heritage and living history. Conversations were captured through drawing and writing on large canvases/ watercolour paper, and students then brought in their own objects, pictures and stories they wanted to share with each other.

As the workshops progressed, group work took place, encouraging the children to design pieces that they would like to build in large-scale 3D. They were invited to choose to create several objects that they agree are important to them all – real or imaginary.

As well as a large focus on visual art working with Alice Dixon, the writer Mary Branley has worked with the children to record some audio pieces that will add another rich interactive layer to share with the wider public.

The work created by children and young people in these workshops will form the basis of an exhibition that will take place in Ballina town as part of the Ballina 2023 celebrations.

Throughout the summer months This Giant Tent is hosting a series of small pop-up workshops, talks and exhibits inviting the wider community to take part and celebrate our shared culture and diversity, focusing on the theme of ‘celebrating our connections’. Some of these have been hosted in a Giant Tent – most notably the recent  paper Traditional Traveller Lashul paper flower-making event delivered by Jolene Collins and Kathleen Collins, members of the Traveller Community on Ballina Salmon Festival’s National Heritage Day. Paper flower crafting was an important part of Traveller culture and at times, represented the only source of income that traditionally a Traveller women could call her own.

On September 12, the Traveller Community will host an event in Ballina celebrating connections, culture and community, and everyone is welcome to attend.

Other events coming up include Beady Pocket making workshops, storytelling, and an Introduction to Cant language workshop.