Irish Embassies Present Global Bloomsday Celebration
Press release
14 June 2022To mark Bloomsday 2022 (June 16) and the centenary year of Joyce’s Ulysses, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Ireland’s global network of Embassies and Consulates have collaborated with dozens of partners worldwide to present their largest global Bloomsday celebration to date.
DFA and Museum of Literature Ireland (MoLI) have collaborated with 35 Irish Embassies and Consulates worldwide to create Hold to the Now, a new short film for Bloomsday. Filming has taken place across five continents, from Cairo to Kyiv, Austin to Abuja, Singapore to Santiago, and Berlin to Brasilia. Performers include actors Stephen Fry and Glenn Keogh (Curb Your Enthusiasm), leading Irish artist Amanda Coogan, and one of the world’s most eminent Joyceans, 94-year-old Dr Fritz Senn, President of the James Joyce Foundation in Zurich. Hold to the Now, with an original score composed and performed by Cormac Begley, will be available to view on the DFA YouTube channel from 9.30am on Tuesday 14 June.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs and Minister for Defence, Simon Coveney, T.D., commented: ‘Our 2022 Bloomsday campaign is a global celebration of Joyce in this centenary year of the publication of ‘Ulysses’, embracing not only literature but film, visual art, performing arts and Irish studies. Global Ireland’s continuing innovation in cultural diplomacy connects new audiences worldwide with Irish ideas and creative excellence through the diverse partnerships forged by our diplomatic network.’
Irish Embassies and Consulates are also marking Bloomsday 2022 with an extraordinary diversity of events in collaboration with local partners. Joycean fans worldwide can enjoy an isiZulu performance of Molly Bloom’s soliloquy in Johannesburg, a Vietnamese version of Dubliners in Hanoi, newly commissioned Ulysses murals by acclaimed Irish artist Aideen Barry in Hungary and by 18 universities across Brazil, a jazz-inflected Joycean song cycle in San Francisco, and much more. Check out the full range of activities at Ireland.ie/Bloomsday.
To reach new global audiences as part of DFA’s Bloomsday campaign, Irish Embassies and Consulates have also organised a second annual Global Joycean Book Giveaway. Over the Bloomsday period, over 3,500 copies of Ulysses, Dubliners and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man are being distributed across four continents, in 12 languages ranging from Vietnamese, Indonesian and Japanese to Portuguese, Hungarian and Croatian. To deliver this, our diplomatic network has partnered with national and public libraries, secondary schools, universities, bookshops, literary cafés and cultural centres, including remote libraries in the Australian outback and street cafés in Indonesia.
In Dublin, Museum of Literature Ireland offers a rich programme of events throughout Bloomsday on 16 June, while the Bloomsday Festival, presented by the James Joyce Centre, embraces an extensive range of programming from 12-18 June, including film screenings, art exhibitions and walking-and-sketching tours of the city. Find out more at bloomsdayfestival.ie, moli.ie and ulysses100.ie.
ENDS
Press Office
14 June 2022
NOTES FOR EDITORS
'Hold To The Now' will be available to view on Youtube here.
HOLD TO THE NOW
A Short Film for Bloomsday 2022
Words from Ulysses by James Joyce
Performers (in order of location):
Abuja: Osasogie Efe Guobadia, actress and Member of the Jos Repertory Theatre
Amman: Rayan Almasri, playing the lead role in a Stability Fund funded film project between Cinemagic (Northern Ireland) and Generations For Peace (Jordan)
Austin: Brian Taylor, BFA Acting student at University of Texas
Belfast: Amanda Coogan, performance artist
Berlin: Sarai Cole, opera singer
Brasilia: Amanda Pessoa Bandeira, student at University of Brasilia
Budapest: Claire Jacobs, actor and member of the Irish community in Hungary
Cairo: Farida Abdelaziz, poet and poetry reader
Dar es Salaam: Dariah Clemence, Irish Embassy staff
Dublin: Nadia Dobryanska, Ukrainian lawyer and human rights activist
Dublin: Adam Mohamed, writer, performer, musician, poet and educator
Dublin: Prof Regina Uí Chollatáin, Head of School of Irish, UCD
Freetown: Salamatu Laggah, Youth Champion of the National Secretariat for the Reduction of Teenage Pregnancy in Sierra Leone and advocate for persons with disabilities
Harare: Chimwemwe Chipidza, actor, musician and writer
Helsinki: Greta Lignell, acting student at Theatre Academy Helsinki
Jakarta: Trinity, travel blogger and writer
Johannesburg: Hlengiwe Lushaba Madlala, actor
Kyiv: Tanya Maksymovich, project manager
Lilongwe: Tamanda Kanjaye, writer, poet, senior editor with Africa in Dialogue, lecturer at University of Malawi
Lisbon: Inês Lapa Lopes, actress
Ljubljana: Gašper Kvartič, actor and academic
London: Stephen Fry, actor, broadcaster, comedian, director and writer
Los Angeles: Glenn Keogh, actor
Luxembourg: Sophie Cotter, Irish/Luxemburgish student
Madrid: Sara Cantó, founder of the Bloomsday Society Madrid
Manchester: Hannah Donelon, actor, musician, award-winning sean-nós folk singer, and clown
Manila: Nicole Mempin, assistant to the Irish Ambassador
Mexico: David Alejandro Ramírez Carrera, dancer
New York, PMUN: Geraldine Byrne Nason, Permanent Representative of Ireland to the United Nations
Nicosia: Lily Michailides, poet
Ottawa: Rory Woodland, performer
San Francisco: Tongo Eisen-Martin, San Francisco’s 8th Poet Laureate and founder of Black Freighter Press
Santiago: Emilio Antilef, poet and writer of Mapuche origin
Singapore: Malcolm Leoi
Sofia: Hristo Tenchev, actor
Tartu: Professor Raili Marling, Head of the Department of English Studies at Tartu University
Valletta: Dr Maria Frendo, academic in the Department of English at the University of Malta
Washington: Christina Sevilla, Picnic Theatre and Office of the United States Trade Representative
Zurich: Dr Fritz Senn, President of the James Joyce Stiftung, Zurich and Joycean scholar
Original Score Composed & Performed by Cormac Begley
Creative Direction: bigO, Eugene Downes & Simon O’Connor
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