Thursday, January 6, 2011

The Wall Street Journal Reports Ireland to Fund Cultural Programs in U.S.

By ERICA ORDEN
January 6, 2011

NEW YORK—The government of Ireland is set to fund a $5.3 million initiative to support a vast array of arts programming in the U.S. during 2011, the country's minister of culture is set to announce Friday in New York.

Encompassing 400 events in 40 states, the project, "Imagine Ireland," will finance programming related to the country at major New York cultural institutions such as the New York Public Library, the Museum of Modern Art and the Brooklyn Academy of Music, as well as support U.S. tours by at least three of Ireland's historic theaters: the Abbey, Gate and Druid.

At the New York Public Library, for example, the project will help fund "Ireland America: The Ties That Bind," an exhibition that examines 19th- and 20th-century Irish-American performance history. Institutions including the Public Theater, P.S. 122, St. Ann's Warehouse and La MaMa, an experimental theater venue, will also present "Imagine Ireland"-backed programming.

Ireland's minister for culture, Mary Hanafin, and New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn will disclose additional details of the yearlong project at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, where they will be joined by actor Gabriel Byrne, cultural ambassador for Ireland.

Additional programming is planned for Washington, D.C., Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco, among other U.S. locations.

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