The Official Galway Arse Festival vs The Provisional Galway Arse Festival.

Sponge Bob

I have found myself being progressively less interested in the Official Arse Festival as it become more and more expensive and utterly irrelevant to me (and in the absence of banging soundsystems in the City Centre on a sunny saturday ) I am not sure what good the new Provisional Arse Festival or fringe event will be and whether it will solve anything .....especially if there are no banging soundsystems in the City Centre either .

One holds out some minor hopes for Mr Whippy and his small and not quite banging soundsystem but we really need banging soundsystems to provide that 'sense of occasion' when there is supposed to be a festival on and the traffic management fascisti will probably do Mr Whippy with a quad clamp unless he is well protected by the groovin masses around him !

Dunno what anyone else thinks but I fear that these Arse Festivals, like the city, are now becoming bourgeois , boring, pointless and middle aged ....just like their organisers !

Mollie Breathna

For the full low down on the Provisional Arse Festival - go here No, really.

Playboy

Sponge Bob wrote:

Dunno what anyone else thinks but I fear that these Arse Festivals, like the city, are now becoming bourgeois , boring, pointless and middle aged ....just like their organisers !

Awww isnt it awful that you don't fit into your percieved stereotype of what the arts festival is and who organises it Maybe its time to have a revolution if the bourgeois are back :rolleyes:

po0k

Apathy abounds.

Feed my inner pyro with night-time spectacle.

forbairt

Mollie Breathna wrote:

For the full low down on the Provisional Arse Festival - go here No, really.

rather confusing ... lots of ha ha ha ??

Mollie Breathna

I know - laughable isn't it!

Robbo

In fairness, the local arts community to a pretty good job of lampooning themselves unintentionally.

Con Air: The Play, ftw.

Amazotheamazing

Think part of the problem is that very few new young people are joining the planning of these festivals, hence they're running out of ideas. If you've a problem with it, join something and change it. Personally I think the Arts festival is great for Galway's profile and wish my native Limerick's EV+A festival could compare with it.

Sponge Bob

Amazotheamazing wrote:

Think part of the problem is that very few new young people are joining the planning of these festivals, hence they're running out of ideas.

Thats because the Official Arse festival is run by an ultra narrow clique of the same people for about the last 20 years and nobody can actually get rid of them because they elect themselves.

Sure they hire a new director every now and then to pretend there is fresh blood but they don't last very long the poor little dears.

Its such a total YAWWWWN for years and is so bloody expensive . I tell people not to go there like I tell them to avoid Castle Park and Tuam .

There has not been a good concert by a modern band since Radiohead in 1997 .

Robbo

"Oh look! It's Macnas! In the parade! With those big heads! And the Incredible Hulk knock offs! How original! Again!"

Playboy

I got to laugh at all this criticism. People never seem to be satisfied. The Arts festival is an international festival that brings huge crowds to Galway creating a brilliant atmosphere and bringing in loads of trade to local businesses when the population of the town is drastically reduced due to the summer exodus of students. Can you imagine July without the arts festival ... the town would be boring and dead. Most other cities and towns in Ireland would kill to have a festival as high profile as the arts festival.

Sponge Bob

Robbo wrote:

"Oh look! It's Macnas! In the parade! With those big heads! Again!"

Actually that was when

1. There was a decent parade , led by Macnas
2. There was some street level sense that good **** was happening in Galway during the festival.

Now

1. Macnas dont do parades any more, they consider themselves to be a theatre group and not the street theatre group which always was their forté, I went to that thing on the UCG tennis court a few years back, it was utterly astonishingly awful. Yet the media in Galway did not acknowledge that the emperor has no clothes any more and gushed over that POS .

2. There is no parade without Macnas is there, roll up them heads lads and remember yeer roots

3. Nowadays all you got is people milling around the streets looking for **** happening but no **** happens at street level any more. There is a sense of aimless drift !

While the Provisional Arse Festival is laudably concerned at involving and publicising loacl artists in all media and are concerned that the Official Festival ignores local artists for Internationally established artists I am equally concerned at the sanitisation of the street level events which are vital to a great festival.

Amazotheamazing

Well Sponge Bob, if that's the way it's going then it's a pity. I remember when I first arrived in Gaillimh, familiar with it's title as Ireland's Cultural Capital and being slightly disappointed that the only discernable culture it had was a pub culture, but I put it down to my ignorance and drank up.

Still it's a shame to lose something that has such a good name and good international standing.

Sponge Bob

I note that the Provos have occupied a no go area in High St opposite Freeneys and they all come out to glare at the Officials when they go past .

Nevertheless the combinations of Officials and Provisionals and the Weather have made it the best Arse Festival in years so I hope they carry on for another few years glaring at each other and trying to outdo each other

Galway needs both I feels.

biko

The Official Galway Arse Festival vs The Provisional Galway Arse Festival.

I'm waiting for the Irish National Liberation Arse Festival

galwayrush

whatever people think of the ferstivals, they sure brought a massive crowd into the city, must be worth millions,
friend of mine had a weird experience here last year, he arrived last day of the arts festival,couldn't believe the amount of crusties, hippies in town, got pissed, went to bed , next morning, he thought he was in a different city, the crusties had gone and were replaced with a crowd of expensive suits and ladies in high fashion.
only in Galway, lol

Sponge Bob

biko wrote:

The Official Galway Arse Festival vs The Provisional Galway Arse Festival.

I'm waiting for the Irish National Liberation Arse Festival

The Crusties are the Real Galway Arse Festival and can do a banging sound system no probs

galah

I'm just appalled at the price of tickets...I mean, come on, 44 Euros for one of the bigger concerts, in a tent??? Surely they could get bigger bands for less, in the name of art?

I have not been to any of the things offered - simply because I think it's a rip-off!

po0k

Fnck 'em.

muppetkiller

Agree with the point about ticket prices ..they are way over priced.
Although at leat this year they managed to get some decent bands...ok maybe just 2 ...Bell X1 and Delorentos..

will'o'wisp

If you feel so miserable about galway and the arts festival why don't you leave or better yet get off your arse and do something about it. When i read comments like yours i wonder why i have been killing myself since feburary trying to make project 06 a sucess with little to no funding.
Spongebob have you actually taken a walk in the last week or have to been too busy pineing for the lost ninetys while listening to house music in your bedroom because i have managed to catch 4 free events and 4 shows for under a fiver and that is on top of work and being in two plays.
you might not know this but the arts festival were not going to have either a parade of a big top at all this year, so project 06 organised their own parade when the AF heard this they went ahead and decided to have one. Project 06 went into talks with mgd to have a big concert, AF stepped in with their big swing and agreed to fund the big tent. However who is hosting them doesn't matter the fact is they are there. And perhaps Mr. whippy was small fry but project 06 doesn't have as big a bat as the offical AF. The point is we are trying and if everyone pulls together to support it maybe things will improve again next year.

Amazotheamazing

There will be a project 07 so?

will'o'wisp

No. There wasn't meant to be a project 06 even but it came to it when the wishes of the common folk repeatedly fell on deaf ears. The idea was to make the official Galway Arts Festival organisers realise that they have to offer more variety and give more support to galway artists the smaller shows, free street entertainment and music aswell as endorseing the big international shows. Hopefully if project 06 is a success they will see there is an audience for everything.

Sponge Bob

willowisp wrote:

If you feel so miserable about galway and the arts festival why don't you leave or better yet get off your arse and do something about it. When i read comments like yours i wonder why i have been killing myself since feburary trying to make project 06 a sucess with little to no funding.
Spongebob have you actually taken a walk in the last week or have to been too busy pineing for the lost ninetys while listening to house music in your bedroom

god you are slow, I spent the 80s (late) listening to techno actually ......house pfffffft

because i have managed to catch 4 free events and 4 shows for under a fiver and that is on top of work and being in two plays.

I couldn't really offer myself up , when I went to offer the provos in the no go area in High street glared at my baby in her pram and made her cry.

you might not know this but the arts festival were not going to have either a parade of a big top at all this year, so project 06 organised their own parade when the AF heard this they went ahead and decided to have one. Project 06 went into talks with mgd to have a big concert, AF stepped in with their big swing and agreed to fund the big tent. However who is hosting them doesn't matter the fact is they are there.

jolly good show . Who persuaded Macnas that they were actually a street theatre thingy by the way , fair ****s to them , Macnas have had their heads in their arses for decades now....or so it seems ???

And perhaps Mr. whippy was small fry but project 06 doesn't have as big a bat as the offical AF. The point is we are trying and if everyone pulls together to support it maybe things will improve again next year.

why not call it the Fringe, which is what it is, instead of having a moan in quay street which is how P06 started. A proper fringe with director (as in organiser not programmer) can get some decent funding itself .

I am pleased at how its all going generally between te Officials and the Provos . There is a sense of occasion about the place that has been missing for years.

I think you can call it project 06 next year too but tell that lot in High St to look happy willya No glowering and glaring .

will'o'wisp

Sponge Bob wrote:

I couldn't really offer myself up , when I went to offer the provos in the no go area in High street glared at my baby in her pram and made her cry.

I also have a toddler. But that is not the point, of course not everyone can get involved. What drives me mad are the people who moan about how bad things are instead of trying to make things better.

Maybe there should be a fringe festival. Why don't you try to organize one? I would be 100% behind you. That however wasn't the point of project 06 which came about following 5 offical meetings with the Af organizers and a public debate in the radission not as you put it a rant on Quay street. It was hoped that the Af who have already (along with macnas and druid) gobbled up most of the arts funding for the galway region would use some of this scarce money to fund local smaller artists. What project 06 is meant to be is a one year only protest to try and proove the talent, desire and audience are there to include all these acts in the official arts festival programme.

Sponge Bob

willowisp wrote:

Maybe there should be a fringe festival. Why don't you try to organize one? I would be 100% behind you. That however wasn't the point of project 06 which came about following 5 offical meetings with the Af organizers and a public debate in the radission not as you put it a rant on Quay street.

There IS a fringe festival. It is called PROJECT 06.

It was hoped that the Af who have already (along with macnas and druid) gobbled up most of the arts funding for the galway region would use some of this scarce money to fund local smaller artists. What project 06 is meant to be is a one year only protest to try and proove the talent, desire and audience are there to include all these acts in the official arts festival programme.

Nope, PROJECT 06 becomes multiyear and fundable and organised or its nothing except a memory . The GAF, as it is, may adopt a few bits of the manifeshto but it will NEVER dumb itself down to the level of some of the PROJECT 06 acts . The Arts council cannot fund Project 06 as it is . Much of their capex came from a tent the official Arts festival lent them (by your admission)

Thats what fringes are for and every sucessful festival gets a fringe eventually......ideally with happy positive energetic types running it and not them scowly jowly glaring types .

ME, I will organise nothing because those glaring High Street people will most likely sit in the front row and glare at me all the time. Galway Arty types are nothing if not fractious and longwinded ......whether of the Official or Provisional ilk and life is too short frankly

My baby still hasn't slept properly , must go get some drugs

Ta Ta