The Ireland Funds - Your Money at Work : Ballinglen

Photo credit: Peter Maxwell

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Beyond Ballinglen Ballinglen has had an impact on the local area, but the ripples extend beyond this corner of Ireland. In the Fall of 2006, a show titled “American Artists in Rural Ireland: the Ballinglen Experience,” was the first comprehensive show to highlight the art of American Fellows of the Ballinglen Foundation.

It told the story of Ballinglen through the eyes, minds, and work of the American artists who have lived and worked there in the last decade and a half.

1. Rush to the Sea iii
by Cynthia Back, Philadelphia.

2. Distant Shore
by Charles Field, Texas

3. Clear Day Towards Glinsk
by Elizabeth O’Reilly, Brooklyn NY

4. Ceide Fields
by Susan Maxfield, Stow, MA

5. Crossmolina Field
by Josette Urso, Brooklyn, NY

Ballinglen Arts Foundation

Founded by Margo Dolan and Peter Maxwell in 1992, the Ballinglen Arts Foundation was begun as a unique rural revitalization project in which artists of international stature come to stay in the village of Ballycastle. To date, over 200 painters, printmakers, and sculptors have experienced the beauty of Ballinglen and created work inspired by its unique environment. Funding from The Ireland Funds enables these international artists to work and live in rural Ireland and supports a Fellowship program that not only facilitates these visits but assists local education and helps maintain a permanent collection of contemporary art in North Mayo.

As Margo Dolan, Founding Director of The Ballinglen Art Foundation shared, “The support from The Ireland Funds has literally made it possible for us to survive.” Ballinglen is proving that there are benefits not just to those who visit, but also to those for whom Ballycastle is home. Recently Ballinglen profiled local residents who have benefited from the ripple effect of Ballinglen’s presence in the local economy of Ballycastle.

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What does The Ballinglen Arts Foundation mean to local kids?
Prints!
Colourful prints that they design and make themselves. With the guidance of a couple of expert adult printmakers, the kids were working in the Foundation’s new print-making studio. It is brilliantly sky-lit and is equipped with a Whelan Press. The fact that this press is the first major redesign of printing presses in 500 years is not significant for the kids because none of them had ever seen a printing press before. But now they all know how to use one.

It is worth noting that neither the school nor the kids were charged for the expert instruction, the paper (100% rag content), the other materials (including the newest water-based/non toxic inks), or the clean-up which, in truth, was extensive.

This workshop class was one of Ballinglen’s Education/Outreach Programmes, which offer not only Printmaking Workshops but also gallery talks and studio visits with the Fellowship artists who are on hand, Art Reference Library consultations, Ballinglen Archive study, and presentations in the Ballinglen Centre and the schools by individual Ballinglen Fellows.

As well as supplying studios and residencies for Irish and International Fellows, the Foundation is committed equally to helping its North Mayo community. The pleasures of print-making are part of that commitment.

Profiles

select > Una Forde | Mary Scott Munnelly | Brian Polke | Yizhak Elyashiv

A Ballycastle native; age: 40s; married, 3 children.

Una came to work with us in January 1998 as our only helpmate. Before joining us her current employment totaled 1/2 day per week in a local shop/pub. She wanted to be on hand for her children before and after school and there was no other job opportunity in Ballycastle. Nine years later Una is now Operations Supervisor at Ballinglen, running the entire day-to-day workings of the Foundation with the help of a second full time employee. Hers is a highly complex job involving international communications, local issues, fundraising, financial and practical skills and great responsibility. Her intelligence and charm are limitless as is her good judgment. In her years of working with artists Una has visited them all in their studios and talked with them about the progress/development of their work. In the process she has gained an understanding of contemporary art and artists matched by few in the international art world. Una is paid a salary with full PRSI and PAYE (Irish Social Security payments) contributed by Ballinglen.

Her life outside the Foundation, and her family's, now includes friendships with international artists, many of whom have given her the original works of art which now hang throughout her home. Two of the children have worked in the Courthouse Gallery during the summers and all have done endless odd jobs for Ballinglen. Una and her husband travel regularly to exhibition openings and art world events throughout Ireland. They have open invitations from artists to visit them in their homes and studios in Ireland and abroad. Think about how different her life would be without the experience of Ballinglen.

Native of the Glen, Ballycastle; age: early 50s; married; 2 children; founder/owner Mary's Cottage Kitchen, Main Street, Ballycastle.

In 1996 The Ballinglen Arts Foundation hosted a painting group affiliated with The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts of 14 female painters, with a couple of husbands. For 1o days they would gather each evening for a formal dinner in our Common Room. At the time there was no restaurant operating in Ballycastle and, by design, Ballinglen built no catering kitchen believing that it was important to ask the community to help. The home economics kitchen of the Convent's secondary school was generously offered by the principal. Mary Munnelly was the cook and each night she produced dinners which encapsulated the best of Irish home cooking. The visitors who had so far sampled the cuisines of Paris, London, Europe, Asia were unanimous in their accolades. It was the validation gained from her work for the Ballinglen group which pushed Mary over the edge. At this time she had been helping her husband with their Ballycastle Chickens business and also working (for 15 years) in Polkes shop/pub. With a degree in catering she was itching for the chance to stop pulling pints and doing routine shop work.

In 1997 Mary bought an early stone cottage at the bottom of the steep hill which forms Ballycastle's Main Street. She transformed it into a special restaurant, retaining the flag floors, open fire, and cottage atmosphere. Specializing in home baking and traditional Irish food, her business has flourished and has become indispensable to the life of the village. And all special dinners and business lunches at the Foundation are still catered by Mary.

Whilst feeding Ballinglen Fellows Mary and her family have become their friends. Her first visit to the US, with both daughters, was hosted by a Ballinglen Fellow who gave them her air miles, inviting them to stay with her family in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Imagine Mary Munnelly's milieu and prospects in Ballycastle in 199o and realize what a difference Ballinglen has created for Mary's business and personal life.

A Ballycastle native; age: mid 70s; married; 4 grown children; grandchildren; owner of Polke's shop/pub (founded 182o by his ancestor).

From the earliest years of dreaming and planning which ultimately produced the Ballinglen Arts Foundation, Brian & Sheila Polke have been closely involved friends of the Foundation. From the arrival of the first Ballinglen Fellows in 1992 Brian was the single most important community contact. His wit, cheer, and highly sophisticated intelligence combined with the desire to help has turned him into an iconic figure among Irish and international artists and their families and to all those who come to visit Ballinglen

. It is undeniable that the steady, year round influx of new customers to his premises has increased his turnover significantly. The economic knock-on effect of Ballinglen is clearly seen in this example. Brian Polke is more prosperous because the Foundation attracts international visitors, inviting artists to come and live in Ballycastle with their companions and friends, bringing in students from outside the village for classes, maintaining and hosting the District Court and operating a public art gallery. Brian is consistently acknowledged and thanked in exhibition catalogues which have been produced worldwide. Ballinglen Fellows are welcomed by Brian & Sheila in their home and they themselves attend countless artist-generated gatherings each year. Nearly every artist presents Brian with a work of art; meaning that the bar, the house, the houses of their children are filled with an important collection of works by their friends from Ballinglen.

Brian's enthusiasm for the workings of Ballinglen is more than just business-deep. For example, possessed of a master key to the Ballinglen Centre, Brian voluntarily acts, as he titled himself, as curator of the Courthouse Gallery when Ballinglen's staff is not working. He has been known to bring interested customers over from the bar at 11 or 12 o'clock at night. If our Charity Status allowed us to sell art in the gallery, Brian, no doubt, would. Imagine Brian Polke's milieu and prospects in Ballycastle in 199o and realize what a difference Ballinglen has made to his business and personal life.

Yizhak Elyashiv fine tuning the delicately engineered rollers of the Whelan Press before pulling a proof in the Printmaking Studio. In the eighteen months since his last Fellowship Yizhak has had major solo shows in Boston and New York City.