Virtual Tour of Nano Nagle Place

You can now tour Nano Nagle Place from the comfort of your own home. This is a superb virtual tour of the museum and much of the site. It’s atmospheric too with the Christmas lights aglow.

Not only can you navigate around the site you can get up close with both the permanent exhibition and ‘Changing Habits’ which Jessie and I developed to mark the 250th anniversary of a convent at Nano Nagle Place. You can read all the text and see all the artefacts and there are videos embedded throughout which provide lots more information (just click on the green dots with the white centre to access the films). The films also highlight the range of activities that take place in the museum.

You can watch and listen to a Baroque concert that took place in the chapel, you can hear some of the nuns talking about their lives at South Presentation Convent (now Nano Nagle Place) and much further afield. You can watch Jessie and I talking about creating the ‘Changing Habits’ exhibition and showing off some of our favourite artefacts. There are films about 18th century Cork and Christmas traditions, a recording on Eilean Ni Chuillenain reading poetry, a seamstress discussing how nun’s habits were made and worn and much more. This is an amazing resource and well worth a virtual visit (even if it’s just to look at the beautiful Christmas lights!)

Come and join us on a tour of the fabulous site by clicking on the image below

Nano Nagle Place Wins Council of Europe Museum Prize

The Council of Europe Museum Prize is the museum equivalent of a Bafta or a Golden Globe. It is awarded by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe to a museum which puts particular emphasis on European perspectives and the interplay between local and European identities, on a commitment to and presentation of key values of democracy, human rights, inter-cultural dialogue, of bridging cultures and overcoming social and political borders.

The winner of this award for 2022 is Nano Nagle Place (NNP) in Cork and I could not be more delighted that NNP is getting such international recognition. NNP is only the second Irish museum to win this award since its inception almost 50 years ago.  Recent recipients include the Gulag History Museum in Moscow (2021), the National Museum of Secret Surveillance “House of Leaves” in Tirana (2020) and the Museum of Communication in Bern (2019). Committee representative for the Museum Prize, Roberto Rampi, noted that, despite being rooted in the specific religious tradition of Roman Catholicism, with nuns still living on the site, there is a strong sense of caring based on need, not on doctrine. Nano Nagle Place has a very strong and coherent mission which is in line with the Council of Europe’s human rights values and principles.

My association with Nano Nagle Place began in 2015 when I was appointed as the historical advisor for the development of the museum which is housed in the nineteenth-century chapel at the centre of the site. I worked closely with Jessie Castle of JCA Architects and we liaised with Sisters of the Presentation and Ursuline Orders and their archivists to develop an exhibition that told stories both of eighteenth-century Cork and of Nano Nagle. (Some of the material we’ve worked with can be seen on below)

Nagle was born into a wealthy Catholic family in 1718. In order to escape the ban on Catholic education that was imposed by the penal laws she attended school in France. When she returned to Cork in the 1750s she was horrified to see that poor Catholic children had almost no access to education and so she set up an number secret schools across the city for them. In the 1770s she facilitated the Ursuline Sisters’ move to Ireland and she later established the Presentation Sisters to continue her work in education.

From the outset of the project it was clear that the museum would be a core element on this site of living heritage where the focus is not just about the past, but also the present and the future. The Presentation congregation’s regeneration of the site has been based around social justice and driven by an interest in community education and development. Nano Nagle Place is now also home to the Lantern Project and the Cork Migrant Centre; community education projects which are focussed on empowering marginalised people through learning.

When choosing what stories to tell and what artefacts to display in the museum Jessie and I were conscious of making connections between the past and the present. Museums are not neutral spaces and we wanted to spark conversations about education, social justice and inclusion. Often when I finish work on an exhibition that marks the end of my direct association with a site, but that hasn’t been the case with Nano Nagle Place. Since it opened to the public in 2017 Jessie and I have kept in close contact with the amazing dynamic team that work on the site. We’ve worked alongside Dr Danielle O’Donovan, the programme manager, Sorcha O’Brien, the learning and outreach officer and Sr Rosarie Lourdan, the congregational archivist, as well as other members of the staff and volunteers. We’ve been constantly impressed by the remarkable work done by the small team at NNP. They’ve transformed the site into a welcoming community hub hosting a huge range of events and activities and have become an extraordinarily positive force in the city and beyond (Click on an image below and it will bring you to others which show the range of activities and events that take place at NNP)

During the spring and summer of this year Jessie and I created a new exhibition for the museum, ‘Changing Habits’, which marked 250 years of the site as a place of education and spirituality. The exhibition reflected the fact the site has seen both continuity and change since the foundation of a convent there in 1771. Convent life today is very different to the that of the eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth centuries and our exhibition reflected those changes. But the exhibition also highlighted areas where there was continuity, particularly with regard to education at the site and the fight for the rights of those who are often marginalised.

Increasingly museums are playing an activist role and Nano Nagle Place has positioned itself as a site that engages fully with its past but is also actively engaged with issues around human rights, cultural exchange and education. It’s been a privilege to play a small part in this and hugely rewarding to see that all the good work that has been done at Nano Nagle Place has been acknowledged on the European stage.

Murder, Writing, Death

I’ve been busy doing interviews, podcasts, lectures, chats recently about everything from historical fiction to the murder of Dr Cronin in Chicago in 1889, to the history of Kilmainham Gaol, to creating an exhibition, to all sorts of stories about misery, death and museums to how I actually go about writing!

I keep forgetting to put them up online, but I’ve finally got around to it and you can find links to them all here:

https://www.gillianobrien.net/interviews

Dublin Festival of History, 26 Sept, 7pm

Come and join Michael Staunton and myself as we chat about Ireland’s obsession with death & darkness (there will be lighter moments too!)

The event is free & online at 7pm on Sunday 26 September

More information & link to booking tickets is here: Dublin Festival of History: https://dublinfestivalofhistory.ie/event/the-darkness-echoing-exploring-irelands-places-of-famine-death-and-rebellion-gillian-obrien-in-conversation-with-michael-staunton/

Song & Dance in Cork

While working on the ‘Changing Habits: 250 Years of Convent Life’ we came across lots of stories that we really wanted to tell but couldn’t. This was either because we were restricted by word count or the stories were quite tangentially connected to South Presentation Convent. But I became fascinated by the history of ballet and choral music in Cork from the mid-20th century. The city had a really dynamic choral and ballet tradition which is often overlooked.

We couldn’t fit all of the story in for the exhibition so I wrote a bit more about it here:

https://www.fanlightheritage.ie/blog/the-real-wealth-of-a-nation-lies-in-the-imagination-of-its-people

Cork World Book Fest

A few weeks ago I chatted with Danielle O’Donovan, Programme Manager at Nano Nagle Place, about The Darkness Echoing. We discusses the importance of museums and heritage sites, getting accidentally locked into one of them & lots of amazing places that people can go and visit now that lockdown has eased.

The Darkness Echoing

The Darkness Echoing was published on 1 October.

I don’t recommend publishing a book in the midst of a global pandemic. While it’s great to see the finished book (and the publishers have done a wonderful job both in terms of design, but also in terms of promoting it) there is something a little bit sad about doing all the promotion at a remove. I miss the chat and the craic and the debates and the conversations that usually come with a new publication.

One of the things I wanted to do with The Darkness Echoing was to spark conversations about how we learn about the past – both formally and informally. I want to open up discussions about our museums, our heritage, our school curriculum, government funding and support (or lack thereof) of our heritage. I’m sure those conversations, discussions, disagreements will happen in time…but it would have been nice to begin them now. There is no time like the present to talk about the past!

I have largely migrated all my research and writing information over to a new website: www.gillianobrien.net where there are lots of photos of the sites I visited on my travels around Ireland and lots more information about the book (and other things that I’m currently working on).

And the book can be bought in all good bookshops! I’m a fan of the independent bookshop, but a sales a sale so buy wherever takes your fancy.

If you’re in Ireland the cheapest out there at the moment is Kenny’s in Galway

And in the UK the new bookshop.org.uk will send it on its merry way.

And while it’s not published yet in the US Blackwell’s will post it from the UK to the US for free!

The (hi)stories we tell…

This semester one of my modules considers why and how we commemorate the past. As part of the course students will look at how events in Irish history – the 1798 Rebellion, the Famine and the Easter Rising – have been celebrated and commemorated by different groups and at different times. And as part of these we’re thinking about what stories get told and why.

Before we tackle Irish history I asked the students to begin a little closer to home. I asked them to bring in an object that meant something to them and to tell the class a story about it. Their stories prompted a discussion about the objects themselves and about why they chose them, but also about what sort of objects and artefacts are displayed in museums, why some objects are deemed more significant that others, why some stories are told and others are not.

In class we learnt about sporting & musical achievements, inspirational animals, tales of hidden families, war stories, fake coins and Christmas decorations. I took photos of the objects and the students wrote labels for them. Here are some of the stories:

 

 

These are small fragments of the Berlin Wall chipped from the wall on 9th November 1989 the day the wall came down. This box holds a piece of the wall and some East German Marks alongside a photograph of the wall being chipped away.

And a couple of stories without images:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(The photos of the objects and their accompanying labels stories all appear with the permission of the students)

Inspirational Museums!

I’ve been writing about some of my most memorable museum and heritage sites recently and was curious as to what other people remembered about their trips to museums, galleries and historic sites.

The responses were fantastic and ranged from memorable childhood visits to seeing something inspirational (and in some cases those childhood visits have really impacted on later career paths)

I’ve done lists about some of my favourite museums and heritage sites before but here’s another list as suggested by other folk. It’s eclectic and people chose them for all sorts of reasons, but I reckon there’s something for everyone here!

These are in no particular order – the first ones listed are places I’ve been to recently and have photos of! Go see the places that others have found inspirational. Other sites were suggested, but I haven’t been to see them yet – I’ve got a list to visit and photograph so no doubt they’ll appear at some stage.

My choice was Kilmainham Gaol. 

I’ve been going there for years and I never tire of it. But it was my first visit as an 8 or 9 year old that was most memorable. I remember the excitement of seeing place that I thought was forbidden and I remember being told the story of Anne Devlin, Robert Emmet’s housekeeper. She was arrested, imprisoned and tortured following the 1803 Rebellion, but she refused to tell the authorities where Emmet was. I think it was the first time I heard a story about a woman in Irish history and I was completely captivated by it.

Rock of Cashel 

Some people were lucky enough to have been able to go to the top of the Cathedral Tower…sadly it’s no longer accessible to the public, but there’s still Cormac Chapel to see and all sorts of tales to be told.

Wicklow Jail

Treadwheel in Wicklow Jail

The jail building dates from the mid-nineteenth century and there’s lots of information about the 1798 Rebellion and the history of prisons in Ireland. I particularly like the rather ghostly prison warden (and dislike the panel about Irish slavery which is inaccurate).

St Oliver Plunkett’s head in Drogheda.

St Oliver Plunkett, Shrine

It seems I wasn’t the only child to be brought there on a school tour. It might not be the best visitor attraction in the country but there’s no doubt it’s memorable!

St Michan’s Church & Crypt, Dublin  – also one of my favourites.

Visit the vaults under the church to see ornate coffins, the last resting place of some United Irishmen, some skulls and some mummified corpses (including a crusader and a nun) who have broken free of their coffins. Apparently some visits encouraged people to touch the crusader’s hand which seems like a very bad idea on some many levels. It’s not something that was encouraged on any visit I’ve ever made.

Carlow County Museum

Housed in the former Presentation Convent this is a a great County museum – it was the prospect of seeing Kevin Barry’s cigarette butt that lured me there.

Cork Public Museum

Possibly the dullest name for a museum in Ireland, but there are all sorts of gems hiding behind the uninspired name. Unfortunately I didn’t photograph most of the gems so instead you get a figurine of Wolfe Tone looking remarkably like Marty Morrissey.

National Museum, Kildare Street, Dublin. Full of treasures (literal and otherwise). And the bog bodies which are amazing. I return time and time again to see them.

Shrine for the Bell of St Patrick

 

EPIC, Dublin. The Irish Emigration Museum is more an experience than a museum. Don’t visit expecting to see artefacts aplenty, but there’s some great interactives and visuals and a broadly positive spin on the Irish emigration experiences which is refreshing.

Abbeystrewry Famine Graveyard, Skibbereen, Co. Cork – the site of a mass grave containing the bodies of c.9,000 unnamed local people who died during the famine.

Newgrange, Co. Meath – I think the visitor centre is undergoing a transformation now (it was very jaded) so the full experience might not be available…though really it’s the passage tomb everyone goes to see and it’s definitely not being refurbished!

Famine Warhouse, Ballingarry, Co. Tipperary.

This is the site of the very short lived Young Irelander Rebellion of 1848. It’s rather disparagingly known as the ‘Battle of Widow McCormack’s Cabbage Patch’. It’s somewhat off the beaten track but worth a jaunt if you’re interested in the Young Irelanders (or what to try and find the ghost that allegedly lives upstairs).

National Gallery, Dublin

Always a gem, and in it’s new revamped version it’s even better.

 

 

 

 

The mystery of the Thames Crosses!

It was one of those ridiculously hot summer days when London feels like an oven. It sensible (and cooler) to wander down beside the Thames rather than above it so I walked along the Thames foreshore from Waterloo Bridge to the Founder’s Arms Pub, just beyond Blackfriars Bridge.

The first cross I spotted

I noticed what looked like a cross attached to river embankment.  It was about 6 feet up and about 12 inches long. The metal had oxidized and rusted and there were some swirls and lines carved into the main part of the crucifix. I took a quick photo and was about to wander off again when a woman approached me. We got chatting and she said she was a mudlark who regularly patrols this part of the foreshore but she’d never noticed the cross before.

It was then I spotted another metal cruciform shape a few meters along, and then another and another. There was no indication of what they were, who had installed them or how long they’d been there. They were all a similar size and at a similar height. Some like those above had quite intricate detail evident when you look closely, When the tide is fully in I think they are submerged beneath the Thames.

If you look closely you can see the detail of a man’s head near the top.

Between Waterloo and Blackfriars I saw about a dozen – some much more ornate than others, some obviously made from found objects – in one a scissors has been used to make part of the cross.

A scissors

I was curious about why they were there, who had put them there, when they were placed there and why they’d were all in the shape of a cross. Someone (or group of people) has gone to a lot of trouble to make them and place them all along the foreshore.  Are memorials for people who had drowned, do they have particular religious symbolism? Surely Google would have an immediate answer. It seemed not. If they are memorials then it seems strange that nobody had publicised them, but there was nothing (or at least nothing I could find) so I took to Twitter.

Twitter gets a bad press, but when it works it’s wonderful. Over the course of the last few days I’ve had all sorts of lovely interactions with people who are just as interested in these as I am. Two people said that they’d spotted similar crosses at other parts of the foreshore – at Pimlico and Vauxhall (on opposite sides of the river). One of those near Pimlico looks as if it’s made from two teaspoons and a kebab skewer.

It was suggested that the ‘Secret Rivers’ exhibition at the Museum of London Docklands might have some information. If anyone does go and discovers something about these artworks do let me know.

I’ve had all sorts suggestions as to what they represent – perhaps they are memorials to people who drowned in the Thames, perhaps they’re some form of Pilgrim crosses, or memorials to those transported from Millbank Prison (where Tate Britain now stands). My friend Ciaran suggested it was the work of the Illuminati and the Vatican Mafia – I’m hoping he’s wrong, for if he’s not my days may be numbered!

They may well be memorials, but very often the point of a memorial is make sure someone is remembered so it’s unusual that there are no names. It’s possible that these are not related to each other, but I think there are too many similarities for that to be the case. Perhaps the person who made these is no longer alive and left no digital footprint. I really have no idea.

Several people has suggested that the crosses may be part of an public art project by Sebastian H-W who has led ‘Mudlark Walks: Flotstam Talismans’ (and is doing so again in September – if you are able to go along please do and see if the mystery can be solved!)

I’ve searched online and can’t find any examples of the talismans that are made in these workshops and the information on previous Mudlark Walks suggests that people can take home, return to the Thames or give away whatever they make. The crosses on the foreshore seem a more deliberate and organised display than this suggests, but who knows (someone I hope!) While the crosses seem made, at least in part, from found objects the detail in some suggest that a lot of time was spent planning and then executing them. If the work is being created by Sebastian H-W then it seems unlikely that it’s part of the Totally Thames events.

Thanks to everyone who has been in touch with information, suggestions and links. I’m glad it’s not jut me that’s fascinated by these fascinating artworks and if anyone can shed light on this mystery please let me know!

Maybe I’ll never discover why these crosses were made and installed. But it’s a reminder to keep looking around, a reminder to take my eyes off my phone and stop racing to get somewhere, a reminder that everywhere has something intriguing if I keep looking for it.