Location:Brenda May Gallery
2 Danks Street
Waterloo NSW
Australia
Hours:
Entry Fee:
Free
Exhibition Event:
Official Opening21/05/2014 5:45 pm
We are all now familiar with Irish Gypsies (Travelers) through the medium of reality TV with My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding becoming a worldwide phenomenon. My photo project focuses on another equality important part of unique Gypsy culture: their pet horses.
After almost five years in Australia I returned home to Ireland and found myself looking at my own country with fresh eyes. With so much change and modernization going on I decided to document one aspect of traditional Irish culture that has remained largely unchanged, for hundreds of years, but will most likely soon fade into the history books.
The project focuses on the annual rural horse fairs and the monthly inner-city Dublin, Smithfield Fair. Rural fairs like Ballinasloe and Spancill Hill have been held one the same date, each year, on the same patch of lush green fields for centuries. The traders: Ireland’s farming community and Travelers meeting to socialize, swap stories and buy and sell horses. In contrast, Dublin’s inner-city Smithfield Fair is one of the city’s oldest traditions dating back to the 17th century.
Held on the first Sunday of each month this chaotic meeting brings together Travelers and the City’s underprivileged in one cobblestone square. The location of this fair interestingly has stayed the same for centuries while the city development has grown up all around it. Once the sight of a traditional sprawling marketplace the square is now completely surrounded by modern apartment and shopping developments.
You can find the photographer’s website here
More information about the exhibition is available here
This event has concluded
Dates:
Location:Brenda May Gallery
2 Danks Street
Waterloo NSW
Australia
