- ▪ Naive Ted
- ▪ Sissy
- ▪ Sky, Horse and Death
- ▪ Wastefellow
- ▪ Ian Whitty
- ▪ Ian Whitty
Festival Details
The festival that rocked the historic spine of Cork City last year is back and launches early bird ticket sales and an exciting array of acts for the festival.
Presented by Makeshift Ensemble and Southern Hospitality Board, and supported by Cork City Council and The Arts Council, Quarter Block Party will take over the North and South Main Street in the heart of Cork City once again for a weekend of music, theatre, art, discussions and performance from 3rd-5th February 2017.
Quarter Block Party fans from the last two years will know the weekend as a daring and exhilarating weekend filled with a selection the freshest in high calibre artists in music and art. The grass roots and DIY vibe to the festival, which made it such a unique experience for Cork, remains with top class music acts and an innovative theatre programme, across a range of unique venues including St. Peter’s Church, Triskel Arts Centre and Spailpín Fánach alongside a range of pop-up & public art events in the shops & spaces along North & South Main Streets over the course of the weekend.
Experimental hip-hop kingpin Naive Ted makes a welcome return to the festival with a new set compiled of the dozens of songs he’s been working and collaborating on. With an eagerly awaited sophomore album on the way, singer songwriter of pop sensibility Ian Whitty brings a stripped back duo show to the weekend, while psychic arrays lead by Kevin Terry Sky, Horse and Death is eccentric ambience. Sissy are a feminist D.I.Y three piece from Dublin who released their first album Gave Birth To A Mum last year. Wastefellow is a producer and vocalist from Dublin. He sings over beats stitched together from a grab bag of influences – delicate melodies soar above fractured beats and walls of bass, all set against a backdrop of melting footage and shifting colours. Something of a supergroup Irene Buckley, Elaine Howley, and Roslyn Steer present Crevice, a collaborative exploration in sound. An improvisatory approach to songwriting provides plenty of opportunity for experimentation as electronic sounds and voices weave different worlds. Music to get lost in.
Two exciting and provocative international dance pieces arrive to Quarter Block Party from Melbourne and Portland. Offering Melanie Jame Wolf’s own experience as a looking glass through which audiences are invited to critically reflect on their own position in relation to stripping; Mira Fuchs draws on the specific vocabularies of this extended eight year bodily practice. This work seeks to explore ideas around gender, sexuality, pleasure, performative intimacy, the gaze, and dance as labour.
Part lecture, part choreographic exposition, Now Then: A Prologue is a solo performance. Slyly humorous and exhibitionaist Allie Hankins weaves seduction, stand-up comedy motifs, and forced voyeurism in an attempt to exhibit the extraordinary and cumbersome illogic of love and sex.
Similarly to previous years, four artists have been invited to respond to North Main street, its history, and the community that inhabits it in the form of original work created specifically for the street. This year there will be a Poetry Machine, a ladder making workshop, a community dinner party, and a nature tour of the marshlands of Cork. The participating artists include Kate O’Shea (visual artist and community activist), Darragh Murphy (field biologist and conservationist), Darragh McLoughlin – (movement/object explorer), and Micheal Cleary (visual artist).
There will be a selection of panel discussions throughout the weekend including a live How Music Works with Nialler 9 and guests, DJ workshops with Gash Collective and much, much more to be announced in January.
Early Bird Weekend Tickets (€35) go on sale Friday 16th December from uticket.ie – Day tickets and special event tickets will be available in January. For more details visit quarterblockparty.com