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CORK County Council and Uillinn: West Cork Arts Centre have announced Julie Merriman and Lara Quinn as the recipients of the 2026 Partnership Residencies at Uillinn: West Cork Arts Centre.
These residencies support artists seeking opportunities to research and develop their practice and to engage with Uillinn, as well as local and diverse communities and the general public. The award includes a studio space at Uillinn, a stipend of €2,500 and opportunities for the public to engage with the work of the selected artists.
Julie Merriman has been awarded the Cork County Council/Uillinn Bealtaine Artist Residency for 2026.
Taking place for the month of May and organised to coincide with Age & Opportunity’s nationwide Bealtaine Festival, which celebrates the arts and creativity as we age, this residency will support Julie exploring the idea of a book as a sequence of spaces in which it is possible for the artist to be curator, producer, publisher, printer and binder.
During the residency, Julie will focus on book art, looking in particular at the structure of the book and how a series of folds in the paper can disrupt conventional spatial arrangement of images and text.
Content will be created on a Japanese mimeograph press (mimeograph is an obsolete stencil and ink print technology) using a stencil method called the File Plate Process. Julie will share her work with the public via several events over the course of the residency including a Bealtaine event at Uillinn towards the end of the residency period.
Lara Quinn has been awarded the Cork County Council/Uillinn Artist Residency for 2026.
Lara’s practice is rooted in a loosely autobiographical narrative, harnessing symbolism from mythology, folklore and the artistic canon as she creates reimagined representations of her lived experiences, all set within the landscape of a mythical Ireland. For her residency at Uillinn (July 29th to August 29th), Lara will produce two new oil paintings inspired by her next performance-film, which will be developed under mentorship with artists Aideen Barry and Áine Phillips, and finalised during her residency at Uillinn. Lara will host an exclusive viewing of her new performance-film along with an artist’s talk discussing insights into her newest body of work and practice at large.
The Mayor of the County of Cork, Cllr Mary Linehan Foley, welcomed the announcement, noting: ‘Cork County Council is delighted to announce these two important artist residencies which form part of an ongoing partnership between Cork County Council and the West Cork Arts Centre.
‘Our partnership with the West Cork Arts Centre aims to promote community engagement in the arts in West Cork and also to support the career progression of artists. I wish Julie and Lara the very best for their residencies and I look forward to seeing the results of their work.
‘I would also like to take this opportunity to thank West Cork Arts Centre for the provision of studio space and administrative support for this programme.’
