Riverbank January programme for mental health

Riverbank Arts Centre is again partnering with First Fortnight in a programme of events and activities built around the arts-based mental health charity. First Fortnight’s annual festival, held throughout January, celebrates the arts as a catalyst for sparking unscripted conversations around mental health.

The programme also serves as a platform for connection, uniting individuals through shared artistic and cultural experiences and is designed to bring heightened mental health awareness, challenge prejudices, and eradicate the stigma around mental ill health.

For art lovers there will be a range of workshops, from mixed-media collage to smartphone photography to working with clay, presented by artists Martina McDonald, Brian Cregan and Marta Golubowska.  

Befriending My Monster by Selma Daniel Dance (Saturday 13th) invites children on a journey down 'Belly Button Lane' to explore those big feelings that they may not know how to talk about yet. There will be a special screening of Irish film Ballywalter (Monday 15th), starring Seána Kerslake and Patrick Kielty. 

First Fortnight Family Day on Saturday 20th features Prose & Pose: Family Yoga Fables, Manga Workshops with artist Amy Louise O’Callaghan, and a screening of When Marnie Was There. 

Kate Escolin will host the first in a series of Sketchbook Clubs (Thursday 18th), which aims to provide a safe space to create. Poet Nell Regan presents an Online Poetry Workshop for Long Haulers (Thursday 18th), which is specially designed to support those with Long Covid (along with other isolating conditions such as CFS/ME). Gemma Walker-Farren and Echo Echo Dance Theatre present Ghosts (Friday 19th), a one-woman show which is about our relationship with fear and how that takes many different forms over the course of a lifetime. The Creative Well come together once more for Sharing the Archive – Creative Well Book Launch & Reflection (Saturday 20th). Max Zanga of Tebi Rex brings Filmore! Escape Room Experience (Friday 26th & Saturday 27th), which will be followed by a live performance on the Saturday at 7pm.

Tickets for events can be booked through the Box Office, either in person or by telephone on 045 448327 Monday to Friday 9.30am-5pm (closed for lunch 2-2.30) and Saturday 10am-1pm. Tickets can also be booked 24/7 on www.riverbank.ie – Online tickets subject to €1 booking fee per ticket.

Photographs use Policy — Privacy Policy