A Coastal Installation by Deborah Warner

July 2012 | Londonderry

In summer 2012, renowned theatre director Deborah Warner will be dotting the Northern Ireland coastline with incredible living artwork. That’s right: living artwork. Incredible, vibrant installations of all sorts will be appear simultaneously from dawn ‘til dusk around Northern Ireland’s rugged coastal cliffs.

Co-commissioned by the Derry/Londonderry Culture Company 2013 for the Cultural Olympiad, the radiant pieces of art will celebrate the magnificent scenery as well as representing love poetry.

If the project’s production company is anything to go by, this event will be absolutely phenomenal. Artichoke has been the team behind some of the most dazzling art productions in the world over the last few years, including the brilliant Dining with Alice in Norfolk, which was documented by Sky Arts. In 2009, Artichoke teamed up with Anthony Gormley for the memorable One & Other project, which saw 2,400 people stand as living art on Trafalgar Square’s fourth plinth for an hour each. This continued for three and a half months. Changing on the hour without fail, each person appeared to represent some kind of cultural or political point to thousands of onlookers. The oldest ‘plinther’ was 84, the youngest was 16 and a total of 12 people stood naked!

Artichoke also produced a high standard of street theatre, such as The Sultan’s Elephant in 2006. Deborah Warner is famed worldwide for her opera and theatre productions, including the Angel Project that was showcased in London, New York and Australia. Through these projects she has earned a reputation for presenting grace and beauty in her work. In recent years, she worked closely with Irish actress Fiona Shaw including their acclaimed production of TS Eliot’s The Waste Land.

Warner also directed the film The Last September (1993), and produced highly acclaimed operas such Mozart’s Don Giovanni and Diary of One Who Vanished by Janáček.

Having considered Deborah’s background then, it’s safe to say we can all expect an installation that is both extraordinary in imagination and in execution.