The Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media has announced the ten recipients of the 2022 Markievicz Award. The award, which was established in 2019 and honours Constance de Markievicz, the first woman elected to the British parliament and a painter, aims to support artists in developing new work that reflects on the role of women in the decade of centenaries (2012–2023).

Ten awards of €25,000 have been granted to artists of varying disciplines including music, opera, theatre, dance, film, circus, literature and visual arts. Among them are opera and theatre director Aoife Spillane-Hinks, and musician and performer Olesya Zdorovetska. 

Spillane-Hinks is a Dublin-based director of opera and theatre who has worked in Ireland and the US. She is the co-founder of Then This Theatre and has curated and directed events for the Abbey Theatre Community and Education Department, the International Literature Festival in Dublin, and for the Royal Irish Academy of Music. She featured in Brian Irvine’s Least Like the Other and in 2021 made her directorial debut with Irish National Opera’s production of Amanda Feery’s A Thing I Cannot Name.

Zdorovetska is a pianist, vocalist and composer whose work spans the genres of jazz, improvisation, Afro-Caribbean, contemporary and experimental music. She regularly composes for film and theatre, and since moving to Dublin in 2011, has been deeply involved in the music scene, including featuring on the Haivka recording by Yurodny Ensemble on Diatribe Records. She is a founder of the UICP (Ukrainian-Irish Cultural Platform) and co-curator of Phonica, an experimental music and poetry platform in Dublin.

The full list of recipients of the award include Emily Aoibheann (circus), Chloe Brenan (film), Tara Kearns (visual arts), Margo McNulty (visual arts), Janet Moran (theatre), Siobhán Ní Dhuinnín (dance), Doireann Ní Ghríofa (literature), and Jody O’Neill (theatre).

Commenting on this year’s recipients, Minister Catherine Martin siad:

I am particularly pleased to meet the artists in person for the announcement of the award this year.  Each recognises the importance of acknowledging, understanding and highlighting the vital role played by women individually and collectively in our history.  I look forward to following the progress of the artists and the new work produced as an outcome of these awards – both elements will contribute to our collective discourse on the vital role of women in the campaign for independence and the 100 years since the foundation of the State.  Creative expression is a vital outlet and resource for our society, in articulating contentious history and informing our present thinking and future aspirations.

Previous recipients of the Markievicz Award include uilleann piper Louise Mulcahy, singer-songwriter Gemma Dunleavy and singer-songwriter Cal Folger Day.

The award is administered by the Arts Council on behalf of the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media.

For more, visit: www.gov.ie.