ARTS FESTIVAL

I’m writing now as someone who would prefer to preach the Gospel of St Paul in a Taliban controlled area of Afghanistan than go to an Irish Arts Festival. Bear that in mind. But go to a recent arts festival I did. It was in  Thomastown, and was some kind of outlying event of the Kilkenny Arts Festival.  

What dragged me there was a longtime friendship with one Niall Harkin, an artist. And the opening of his exhibition. In all honesty I feared the worst. Because he had told me in recent times that he had given up painting and had taken up sculpture. This struck me as akin to myself giving up writing and taking up painting, or indeed, having a bash at brain surgery…just like that.

Further nerves were jangled by the information that the sculpture he had taken up involved angle grinders and welding and the like. I had a vision of bits of old gates welded to tractor axles. And the printed invitation to the event did nothing to comfort. It stated that it was to be opened by one Theo Dorgan. Of whom I had very vaguely heard, but nothing bad nor nothing good. I had the impression he was some kind of writer. And I suppose that was as far as it went. Ireland is coming down with some kind of writers, including my good self. But then, I noticed, appended to his name, the ominous words “Member of Aosdana”.

This is in no way a comforting announcement. Aosdana, (which is Old Irish meaning “a gathering of the mediocre and delusional”), is a taxpayer funded body famous for honouring the late Francis Stewart, (a Nazi broadcaster based in Germany in the 2^nd WW), and in more recent years, maintaining as member one Cathal O Searchaigh (a poet exposed as a sex tourist). But be all that as it may, needs must, etc. I went to the arts festival.

The consort and I drove from County Mayo. In Dublin we met up with my friend Michael the Mystic and his former consort, now sadly estranged. But not estranged enough to not give us a lift to Kilkenny in her Mercedes. There are many reasons for splitting up with a woman, but the fact that she owns a flash car doesn’t strike me as one.

Off we sped.

En Route Michael the Mystic told me that he doesn’t like motorways. Says that they are an affront to the earth which is a living organism, and should not be offended by swathes of concrete. But still and all he didn’t take to the fields, no, he stayed sitting beside me in the back of the air conditioned Merc, his estranged consort driving and my non-estranged one navigating.

We arrived in Thomastown early, and lunched in The Sol Bistro.  Goats cheese and rocket salad featured. Bear this in mind. As soon as you start lunching on goats cheese and rocket salad you know you’re in a vortex which can only end in your being sucked into an arts festival. Inevitable. And so it was.

We wended our way to the exhibition.The sculpture was surprisingly good, nicely wrought and decorative, gently analytical but not overly challenging. Niall and the gallery apparachik ran around sticking red dots onto plinths. Theo Dorgan turned out to be very small and very bearded. But he overcame his Aosdana membership and made a good speech. I met a Belgian. And an Irish woman I know blanked both myself and my consort. “What’s her problem”, I asked the consort. “You wrote something rude about her in A Walk on The Southside ”, she reminded.

“Oh for godsakes” I said.

And we left.

In an adjoining gallery a pretty girl by name of Roisin Leadbetter was exhibiting her paintings. She couldn’t really paint but she was very decorative herself. I popped in, chatted. I asked her if she was related to my mate  Gordon Leadbetter. She wasn’t. I left.

Back in the Merc and back to Dublin. We stopped at  Leighlinbridge for a pint at the Lord Bagenal Hotel. It’s very big and very vulgar and looks like it was designed by the architect of Sadaam Hussein’s palaces. But one can sit by the river on a terrace. Michael the Mystic’s estranged one and I had a difference about the pronounciation of Leighlinbridge. She said it was lay and I told her no, it was lock, pronounciation wise. LOCKlinbridge. I am right. My company once published a book about the place. Molaise. By Colm Kenny. He doesn’t talk to me anymore. This happens quite a lot.

Conan K

 (PS: Read some of my poetry at deaddrunkdublin )