Aideen Barry and Sinéad Gleeson

This literary strand of Cork Midsummer Festival will explore, through cross artform collaboration, performance and conversation, the artistic frequencies, echoes and fever dreams over which we broadcast self and other culture, community, presence and absence.

Aideen Barry is a conceptual artist based in Ireland whose interdisciplinary practice spans film, performance, sculpture, and experimental lens-based media. Her work explores visual illusion and societal systems through large-scale, collaborative projects. Recent collaborators include Peter Gabriel, William Kentridge, Inuit throat singer Riit, choreographers Junk Ensemble, and writer Sinéad Gleeson. Her feature film Klostės, created with nearly 1,000 Lithuanian citizens, is part of the National Collection at IMMA and contributed to Kaunas receiving UNESCO World Heritage status. Barry’s work has shown at the Bangkok Art Biennale, the Irish Museum of Modern Art, the BFI, Weltmuseum Wien, Art OMI, and the NASA Kennedy Space Center. A member of Aosdána and the Royal Hibernian Academy, her work is held in collections internationally. Barry continues to expand access to visual culture through collaborative, critically engaged artworks.

Sinéad Gleeson is the author of Constellations: Reflections from Life, which won Non-Fiction Book of the Year at the Irish Book Awards and the Dalkey Literary Award for Emerging Writer. The collection was also shortlisted for the Rathbones Folio Prize, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, and the Michel Déon Prize, and has been translated into multiple languages. She is the editor of four anthologies, including The Art of the Glimpse, The Long Gaze Back, and The Glass Shore, and is co-editor with Kim Gordon of This Woman’s Work: Essays on Music. Gleeson has collaborated with visual artists and musicians on interdisciplinary projects commissioned by the Wellcome Collection, BBC, the RHA Gallery, Rua Red, and Frieze. Her debut novel, Hagstone, was published by 4th Estate in 2024. She lives and works in Ireland. Literature Cork / Dublin, Ireland 46 University College