October 14, 2017

Baboró is delighted to announce the participants who will take part in two new strands of its GROW programme, Pathways to Production and Festival Mentoring, which supports artists in making work for children and young audiences. The participants were selected from a competitive application process.

The GROW programme hopes to solidify and support the development of artists and the TYA (Theatre for Young Audiences) sector in Galway and throughout the country. The Irish Theatre Institute (ITI) is partnering on GROW in an advisory capacity on the Pathways to Production and Festival Mentoring strands.

Pathways to Production Participants

This new initiative led by Baboró will commence in October 2017 and is funded by the Arts Council’s Theatre Artist Development Scheme. The partner organisations on this scheme are"

• Druid and the Mick Lally Theatre
• Branar Téatar de Phaistí
• Galway Theatre Festival
• Irish Theatre Institute

The programme will support artists and young companies to develop their ideas with a view to presenting a full performance piece. The scheme will involve practical workshops, sharings of works-in-progress as well as support in developing funding strategies.

The participants are:

1. Manuela Corbari (A Little Door)

Manuela Corbari is a documentary film editor and lecturer in GMIT. Manuela recently became interested in making theatre for children. She is a Baboró Associate Artist and has attended Small size Artistic Director’s gatherings on behalf of Baboró for the past 3 years. She is interested in making work for early years and currently has a number of works in development.

2. Mollie Molumby (Bombinate Theatre)

Mollie is a member of Bombinate Theatre, an award-winning collective of emerging artists making work for families and young audiences. ‘Bombinate’ means to make a buzzing or a humming sound. Their plays and workshops encourage children to make noise, to ask big questions and to stay on their own buzz. Their debut play Half Light was winner of the First Fortnight Award at Dublin Fringe 2016.

Festival Mentoring

The Festival Mentoring programme will see four artists and creatives attend shows during this year’s Baboró International Arts Festival for Children, which runs from 16 – 22 October in Galway. They will also attend industry and networking events and practical workshops. The programme is aimed at artists at any stage of their career, including those with an established career, who have never before made work for children.

The four participants will receive mentoring from two highly experienced individuals from within the sector:

• Phil Kingston, Community and Education Manager at the Abbey Theatre
• Maria Fleming, Chair of Theatre for Young Audiences Ireland (TYAI) and Freelance Producer

1. Clare Barrett

Clare is an actor originally from Galway but now living in Dublin. Her most recent work was performing in a live installation piece called ‘NOT AT HOME’ as part of the Dublin Fringe Festival. She has also been participating in the continued development of a new musical about family for family audiences.

2. Phillida Eves

Phillida is from Galway and has extensive experience working with children, both mainstream children and Special Educational Needs (SEN) children in the classroom and through facilitating creative arts workshops for groups and families with SEN children. She is particularly interested in developing sensory theatre for children. 

3. Lea Pepper

Lea is from Dublin and is currently in her third year of the BA in Contemporary and Applied theatre studies based in Mary Immaculate College, Limerick. As part of the course she is currently doing a placement in AXIS Arts Centre in Ballymun, Dublin gaining hands-on experience of the arts in a community setting. 

4. Bianca Paige Smith

Bianca is a dancer based in Galway. Recently she developed a duet entitled Two Can Do. The duet was shown at the Limerick Fringe Festival and won the Most Innovative Show award. Bianca has also been performing and training with the Step Up Dance Project at UL in Limerick.