This week on Inside Culture Fionn Davenport joins writer Stacey Gregg and director Sophie Motley as they rehearse their play Override for this year’s Tiger Dublin Fringe Festival. The play is set in 2076 as humans attempt to live in a tech free world and a world where the body is free of any enhancements. It centres on one couple, Violet and Mark as they cope with the limitations of this ambition. Stacey and Sophie discuss the world of transhumanism and augmentation and explain to Fionn how tension and conflict will be key to any human drama both onstage and off. We hear short scenes from the play and we also hear about Stacey Gregg’s work Scorch which will open soon at The Everyman Theatre in Cork.
British computer scientist Dr Sue Black first visited Bletchley Park in 2003. During WWII it was the centre of British code-breaking operations but in the decades that followed the former estate had become so run down that Sue decided to attempt to rescue it from neglect. She tells Fionn about the success of this campaign – much of it on social media – and she recalls everyday life as the many women and men living there would have experienced during the war. She also speaks about how social media and technology can empower some of the most marginalised and disadvantaged in our society.
Painter, Dreamer, Clown is a retrospective of the work of Belfast born painter Gerard Dillon. It’s running at The Ulster Museum and Regan Hutchins joins curator Dr. Riann Coulter there to hear about the painter’s life and to look at some of his most important paintings. Dillon lived in Belfast, London, Dublin and in Connemara. His sexuality, mostly hidden in his own lifetime, can be seen in his paintings through codes and little hints which, Dr. Coulter says, are often jokes he played for people ‘in the know’.
Yellow Bungalow – Gerard Dillon
Jazz musician Brian Dunning and music journalist Billy O’Hanluain join Fionn in studio to remember their friend the Irish jazz guitarist Louis Stewart who died recently. Stewart gained international recognition in 1968 when he won the prestigious Montreaux award for best soloist. They explain to Fionn how his decision not to leave Ireland encouraged a new generation of Irish jazz musicians as they learned from him.
Louis Stewart
Scottish designer Ivor Williams specialises in design for death and dying at the Helix Centre at St. Mary’s Hospital in London – a healthcare innovation exchange which explores the transformative effects of design on health , and as part of his research and consultancy group called Being and Dying. Fionn meets him at The Science Gallery in Dublin to hear about his work and how technology can be used to help young people come to terms with grief.
Broadcast on 05 September 2016
