I brought the dream of flying, GOMA 2023

 I brought the dream of flying exhibition by Corina Duyn & Caroline Schofield. Supported by Waterford Healing Arts Trust, GOMA, and Creative Waterford

(Copied from website)

 Pascale De Coninck, Corina Duyn, Caroline Schofield
 GOMA

In April 2021 I moved into long term care. The I brought the dream of flying exhibition by artists Corina Duyn and Caroline Schofield came as a result of this move. It took place at GOMA Gallery of Modern Art, Waterford from 14 January to 11 February 2023.  “Inspired by a broken-winged bird puppet which accompanied Corina when she moved to full-time nursing home care last year, the exhibition features work made in response to this move and illustrates the new collaborative creative process Corina has developed with Caroline as a result of her increasing disability…” The exhibition was presented by Waterford Healing Arts Trust and GOMA, with funding from Creative Waterford. See full WONDERFUL PRESS RELEASE  WHAT or GOMA

We were very honoured to have had many of the art from the exhibition included in the creative program of Creative Brain Week in Dublin. 6-11 March 2023. With a lunch time talk at the gallery on Wednesday 8th March. Talk by Maeve Butler (WHAT), Caroline Schofield and Dominic Campbell, Curator and Programmer Creative Brain Week. Unfortunately I was too ill to take part but I was ‘there’ via a voice recording, and the screening of the ‘Invisible Octopus’ video poem .

Creative Brain Week

Further resources: 

Full Case Study on Arts + Health.ie from early collaboration to exhibition in Waterford, Dublin and creative life beyond. (Published 1 June 2023)

Short video of my visit on 31-1-23 YouTube (6 minutes)

Launch talk video on GOMA YouTube  (19 minutes) 

Invisible Octopus Poem

There are many many photos, comments, reviews etc shared on my FACEBOOK page during the exhibition time. I hope you can view the posts there, if you wish.

Radio: To listen to radio podcast with WLR FM’s WLR FM’s Geoff Harris, Caroline Schofield, and me, recorded in the Treehouse on 23rd January 2023 aired on the 24th at ‘On the Fringe’ Arts program (15 minutes) 

Maeve Butler from WHAT spoke with Geoff Harris with great passion as well as an informative reflective invitation to experience the exhibition on the 17th January To listen back go to listen back choose date: 17-01-2023  ‘The Lunchbox’ 12:00-13:00  section. It starts at approximately 32 minutes in, just over (7 minutes).

Thank you to Waterford News & Star and Munster Express for wide coverage of the exhibition. And all the support, images and reflections shared in person and on social media from many many people. Including the Worldwide ME Communities. ME International newsletter February 2023; ME Global: ‘I brought the Dream of flying’ Dec. 2022 issue of the ME Global Chronicle. And ME Global Chronicle #44 A word of thanks: ME Advocates Ireland Facebook page 

My deepest gratitude.

Looking a bit deeper:

17 December 2022 I published my blog post ‘600 days (in care) reflecting on life in care and the then upcoming exhibition:  

May 2021 I wrote about Moving into the TreeHouse

The Power of the Puppet lecture video

My apologies for rarely showing up here. I do write occasionally a short reflection on my Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/corina.duyn.7

Today there was a longer post, which might be of interest:

“The Power of the Puppet” Video-Lecture is now available on https://youtu.be/j5cFBtk5Oao  High resolution. In English, with Spanish and English, and Dutch subtitles. ** 

Or on Arts+Health website : https://www.artsandhealth.ie/videos/the-power-of-the-puppet/  with this introduction:

 “The Power of the Puppet is a video lecture by Corina Duyn documenting her 23 year long creative journey through chronic illness. The lecture focuses on her puppetry work.

Corina trained as a nurse and social care worker in her native Netherlands before moving to Ireland in 1989. An artist and puppet designer, Corina has been exploring the internal landscape of illness in her work since she was diagnosed with Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (M.E.) in 1998.

This video was initially created in 2021 for the Puppetry Therapy Diploma at the Muñecoterapia in Chile where Corina’s work forms part of their lecture series.

Here is a blog https://corinaduyn.blogspot.com/2021/09/M.E.creativity%20.html  with links to most of Corina’s work for those wanting to know more about the art and story in the video.

In English with Spanish (Translated by Myli Pincheira V. ) and English subtitles. Dutch subtitles added, translation by Rob Wijbenga. With thanks.

Thank you Emma from artsandhealth.ie for embedding the lecture in their video archives. And the continued support from Puppets InTransit  Andrea and Polo. And Emma Fisher for helping me to Create the video.

The lecture is 49 minutes long. My voice and images of my work, mainly that of exploring ME through puppetry. All in small sections so can be watched in snippets.

** For those with ME and extreme sound sensitivity, there is only one section with music in the “Life Outside the Box” puppet project I facilitated in 2015. This section is 14 minutes in, lasting about 4 minutes.

The rest is just my (soft) voice. There is no fast moving imagery, except briefly in the “Life Ouside the box” video.

As there are subtitles throughout, the sound can be turned off completely if you wish.

(Image is screenshot of the video - puppet in a wheelchair in the garden)

Change, acceptance and new creative opportunities

Big decisions followed by acceptance allow me to move forward. Again.

Maybe I will start working on my photo album cover again too…

After too many physical/mental challenges to create the video presentation for Cork Puppetry Festival, attend (briefly) 2 zoom meetings (Cork, and Chile), and being encouraged to be more part of the community here, I had to concede that I need to be much more in tune, respected, and clear in what I can and can no longer do. Unfortunately a lot less…

I will have to listen much better to what my body needs. And put expectations aside. My own, and from others.

Creatively I have made the decision that I will no longer do any online events. The physical collapses were just too scary to justify any further involvement in them.

However it was utterly beautiful and a huge honour to share my work, my stories, and to communicate with some amazing people over the years. 

I do realise that anyone who wants to hear, read, see my work, there is enough material out there. Over time I intend to create a list of links to talks, podcast, videos etc. and share it on my blog. (For now, there is lots on my website and blog, including links to videos and podcasts) Maybe I’ll extend last week’s video, but certainly not yet!

As always, when decision are made, and I fully accept them, in this case to withdraw from public online engagements, a beautiful opportunity arose.

In stead of giving I will be receiving. The universe as always heard me, and supported me.

Request for Assistance

Months ago I put a request in for Personal Assistance (PA) through Disability Services, in order to be able to explore life a little more outside my room, as well as receive support creatively. The application is in…. And as before, that is where it stayed. (Probably when it is granted, it is too late to be able to explore the world outside my room…)

Anyway. To find a way ‘out’ in the meantime, I put out a call in a private group of artist - and in a subsequent beautiful turn of  events I have very gratefully accepted one to one support through Waterford Healing Arts Trust. (WHAT)

My first contacts with WHAT was the invitation to give a talk in 2004

From next Thursday I will be collaborating with artist Caroline Schofield to see what and where and how my current abilities fit to continue to use my creative mind. As we talked on the phone yesterday we both acknowledged that this isn’t just me getting support, but it is very much a process for both of us. Hence using the word collaboration. 

I think this contact will also help me to start working on the embroidered tree again (See first image and here ) and other unfinished projects.

I now need to be horizontal a great deal of the time. Communicating is now only possible if I lay flat. This will also be the case for creative work. I imagine.

Initially there will be three sessions with Caroline. No idea what will happen, but after a phone call yesterday with the artist the Tree, and my Tree House will be central to our collaboration.

It has been a tough learning process. Again!

Time to rest, rest, rest, and then play.

Be well and much love.

Further reading: 

• Cork Puppetry Festival transcript: http://corinaduyn.blogspot.com/2021/07/presentation-at-cork-puppetry-festival.html
• Moving into long term care: http://corinaduyn.blogspot.com/2021/05/my-tree-house-moving-into-long-term-care.html
• Interestingly, I announced my retirement back in March: http://corinaduyn.blogspot.com/2021/03/early-retirement.html
• In October I had already told myself that ‘Invisible Octopus’ was my last work to explore ME http://corinaduyn.blogspot.com/2020/09/invisible-octopus-demands-of-creative.html Little did I know how much my life would change months later.