Following an annual tradition, Trinity Arts Festival (TAF) transformed the Graduates Memorial Building (GMB) into an otherworldly dimension last night and delivered an art, music and theatre event that has become a highlight of the collegiate calendar.
Thematically the event was inspired by Irish folklore and the event was an opportunity for collaboration and displaying the very best of what Trinity’s societies have to offer. Every society had an important collaborative role to play in ensuring the theme of the evening was executed to the highest standard. 27 societies in total were involved in the creation of a mystical netherworld grounded in the Irish tradition of storytelling and myth.
Visitors were ushered into the kaleidoscopically illuminated GMB by cloaked figures at the front door. Speaking as Gaeilge, these magi guided us into the debating chamber, where actors representing Trinity Musical Theatre (TMT), TAF and DU Players commenced the evening with a performance inspired by the Irish myth of the Children of Lir.
The jaded children have grown weary with their existence on the mortal plane and are seeking a place of solace, namely Tír na nÓg, a transcendental plane whose inhabitants are immortal and happiness is everlasting. This performance grounded the evening contextually and provided the visitors with the milieu for which the evening was set. TAF had endeavoured to convert the building into Tír na nÓg for the evening.
Upstairs, costumed figures swanned from room to room, greeting the spectators in a manner that was lively and at times unsettling. Refreshments were offered in one of the ground floor areas, and the hall of the building was vividly lit, with white petticoats suspended from the ceiling. Each room had a distinctly different theme relating to the mythological world of old Éire, all with a highly imaginative flair.
In one of the upstairs rooms, DU Dance enraptured audiences with a series of routines, as Trinity Visual Arts Society (VisArts), sheltered in a booth shrouded in sheer fabrics painting the faces of those who approached. In another room, a velvet-clad lady proffered a bowl of hard sweets in my direction and shrieked like a banshee when I thanked her. The spirit of the evening was not lost on the audiences, who were both delighted and disquieted by the actors’ convincing performances.
DU Food and Drink upheld the evening’s theme marvellously, providing a delectable spread of provisions for the audience, including the legendary salmon of knowledge, accompanied by soft cheeses and grapes. In the same room, Trinity Fashion Society’s stand was crewed with some of Saint Brigid’s devotees, who spoke in soft tones of Brigid’s tale and tied pieces of scrap fabric around the wrists of those who approached. On the landing of the second floor, members of DU Comedy donned devil horns and flung insults and loud bangers at passers-by, contributing to the unsettling and eerie atmosphere the societies had endeavoured to create.
The colour scheme in each of the rooms of the GMB greatly added to tying together the theme of the evening, and Trinity’s Jazz Society performed an energetic jam session in the pool room, which was bathed in crimson tones. DU Film Society screened a black-and-white flick against one of the walls.
The spectators reached the zenith of the evening after scaling the steps to the very top of the GMB, where DUDJ had transformed the room into a rapturous, ethereal world, bedecked with fluffy clouds and soft lighting. With music varying from sublime trance to more groovy melodies, visitors enjoyed the evening’s apex after hazarding through the phantasmagorical world set out for them by College’s societies. The evening concluded with another performance in the debating chamber, wherein the previously adrift Children of Lir had made it to their promised land.
On an evening that was truly a vision to behold, TAF’s members once again outdid themselves to create a mythical, surreal realm in one of the campus’s most versatile spaces. Their fairytale vision enthralled the huge crowd, lifting them from terra firma to a celestial netherworld.
