Benjamin Dwyer's 'Sacrum Profanum' at the Irish Cultural Centre (London Premiere)

10 September 2022 20:00

“SacrumProfanum”, by Benjamin Dywer (amplified ensemble and tape)

Featuring: Garth Knox (viola), Emma Coulthard (flutes), Siobhán Armstrong (medieval Irish harp, voice - Sean Nós),Benjamin Dwyer (bowed guitar), Jona Xhepa (text), Donnacha Dwyer (uillean pipes, recorded).

SacrumProfanum is a multimedia work for amplified musicians and tape that explores Sheela-na-gigs, the enigmatic stone carvings found in Ireland and parts of Britain.

Benjamin Dwyer has spent the last ten years travelling across Ireland studying, photographing and sketching these mysterious figures. Responding artistically through the Sheela ‘as witness’, Dwyer has created a unique work exploring themes such as feminism, colonialism, identity, religion, rite, landscape, sexuality and the disintegration of Gaelic culture.

In a score that combines contemporary music, interfacing with traditional Irish forms, instruments and sean-nós singing, SacrumProfanum offers perceptive critiques of contemporary exploitations of Irish culture. It investigates these themes through raw, visceral, often abject but ultimately poignant and deeply affecting music.

SacrumProfanum features internationally renowned performers: violist Garth Knox, flautist Emma Coulthard, medieval Irish harpist and sean-nós singer Siobhán Armstrong, Benjamin Dwyer on bowed guitar, and uillean piper Donnacha (featured on the tape part). Poet Jona Xhepa has written a specially commissioned poem entitled Sheela-na-gig, and the work incorporates a number of Gaelic texts sourced by Siobhán Armstrong.