Following the success of our first two festivals, our third weekend will showcase the current burst of exploration and re-engagement with Classics and the ancient world. Artists, writers and thinkers, international and Irish, are taking Classics as a lens to examine our contemporary cultural and political preoccupations and challenges.
Our three-day programme in January will present a series of inviting encounters including readings and performances, online and live in Dublin's public spaces - art galleries and cultural centres - with a number of events aimed at second and third-level students. In interviews, discussions, film screenings and musical theatre performances, you will meet artists who are working in different genres and art forms, in thought-provoking and imaginative ways.
Come and join the new Renaissance.
Twitter/ Instagram @ClassicsNowFest
In this year’s festival we’re tracing the haunting myth of Orpheus, the Thracian poet and singer with divine powers. For over 2,500 years the story of this archetypal artist-poet has been adapted and represented in Western literature, music, painting and film.
Join us for a special ClassicsNow opening night performance at theNational Concert Hall, with baritone Rory Musgrave, composer Andrew Synnott on piano, and actor Tara Lynne O’Neill. Directed by Conor Hanratty; in partnership with Poetry Ireland.
In a selection of music and poetry we will hear echoes of Orpheus and his lover, Eurydice, through the words of Ovid and Rilke along with contemporary Irish poets; the music of Monteverdi, Glück, Saint-Saëns, as well as recent interpretations.
Friday January 27th, 7pm, Kevin Barry Room, NCH.
Booking opens on January 9th.
In our second event tracing the many facets of Orpheus in music, poetry and images,ClassicsNow partners with the Irish Film Institute for a screening of Orphée. In this luminous black-and-white film, the French poet, playwright, artist and filmmaker Jean Cocteau transposes the myth of Orpheus to 1950s Paris. Introduced by Sinéad MacAodh, Director of Literature Ireland.
Sunday 29 January, 6.15 pm, IFI.
Join Museum Curator Dr Joanna Day for a guided tour of the Classical Museum, University College Dublin, the largest collection of Classical antiquities on display in Ireland. To take a closer look at these artefacts, we invite you to respond creatively through your own artwork in a drawing workshop with artist Genevieve Harden. (No previous art experience required. Materials provided.)
Saturday January 28th. Tour, 11-11.45 am; workshop, 12 noon-1.30 pm.
Natalie Haynes in Dublin: bringing insight and originality to her readings of Classical myth, drama and history, this award-winning author and broadcaster will introduce her latest novel, Stone Blind, a dazzling reinterpretation of the story of Medusa. In partnership with the Abbey Theatre. Peacock stage. Saturday January 28th, 6pm.
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Nostos, Return to Ithaca: join us to watch new episodes of Gavin Kostick’s dynamic version of Homer’s Odyssey take shape, in a special work-in-progress presentation, performed by composer Andrew Synnott, with playwright Gavin Kostick and dance artist Megan Kennedy. In partnership with Dublin City Gallery: the Hugh Lane.
Sunday January 29th, 12 noon. Booking opens on January 23rd.
In Antigone Rising: The Subversive Power of the Ancient Myths, renowned Classics scholar Helen Morales (pictured, bottom) explores contemporary recreations of myth and the questions they pose. She will be in conversation with classicist Stephanie McCarter, whose new feminist translation of Ovid’s Metamorphoses speaks powerfully to our 21st century world. Online event; watch from Friday January 27th.
Award-winning classicist Shadi Bartsch’s publications include a gripping new translation of Virgil’sAeneid. Her latest book, Plato Goes To China: the Greek Classics and Chinese Nationalism, is a cross-cultural study of Chinese readings of Plato, Aristotle and Thucydides. She will be joined online by acclaimed Classical scholar and broadcaster, Professor Mary Beard, author of Confronting the Classics, among many works.
Online event, available from Sunday 29th January.
Who speaks here? I do, little god, the great ones having absconded.’ Enter Hermes, the god who narrates The Singularities, the latest novel by Booker-prize winning author, John Banville. He will be in conversation with novelist and biographer Laura Beatty, whose new book, Looking For Theophrastus: travels in search of a lost philosopher, is a fascinating quest to recover traces of the ancient past.
National Concert Hall Studio, Sunday January 29th, 3.30 pm.
Drawing on artists’ insights into performing and directing Ancient Greek tragedy for modern audiences, our second event in partnership with the Abbey Theatre is a panel discussion and Q&A with leading theatre artists Derbhle Crotty, Eileen Walsh and director Erica Whyman, chaired by dramaturg Dr Tanya Dean. Peacock stage. Saturday January 28th, 3pm.
