Mean Time live broadcast on RTE Lyric fm
Up until the 1st of October 1916 Ireland was on Dublin Mean Time which was 25 minutes and 21 seconds behind Greenwich Mean Time. On that day when England put its clock back by an hour for Winter, Ireland put its clock back by 35 minutes and ended the historic time difference between the two countries. Mean Time is a collaborative art project inspired by this event and particularly by Countess Markievicz's opposition to what she saw as one more piece of colonial oppression; the imposition of a foreign time on what should have been a sovereign people. The project brought ten professional female sound artists from Ireland and abroad to the historical location of Richmond Barracks in Dublin city, where 77 women were remanded after their involvement in the 1916 Rising. They performed a unique improvisation based on especially commissioned pieces on the theme of these lost 25 minutes for the anniversary of the abolition of Dublin Mean Time. The event combined contemporary music, performance art, radio art and electroacoustic composition, 'clawing back' time lost and imagining many possible future Irelands. The programme was broadcast live on Nova on 2nd October 2016. The participating artists were Daria Baiocchi, Fiona Hallinan, La Cosa Preziosa, Vicky Langan, Úna Lee, Olivia Louvel, Jenn Kirby, Claudia Molitor, Gráinne Mulvey and Rachel Ní Chuinn.
Mean Time rehearsals :: Richmond Barracks :: Oct 2016 photo Michael O'Kane