Irish filmmaker / editor Dónal Ó Céilleachair, whose editing credits include John Bush’s ‘Vajra Sky over Tibet’, is set to give a series of filmmaking workshops to students after being named filmmaker in residence at Ionad Culturtha in Cork’s Muskerry Gaeltacht.
Ó Céilleachair takes up a two month residency supported by Ionad Culturtha, Ealaíon na Gaeltachta and Cork County Council Arts Office and will give series of workshops to over 150 primary and secondary school students in topics including creative documentary making and experimental film. Three 5 to 15 minute films produced by the students will screen at Ionad Cultúrtha in early autumn.
TCD graduate Ó'Céilleachair has worked on over 40 films in the past 15 years and was editor and associate producer on a trilogy of feature documentaries exploring the lost Buddhist civilizations and spiritual traditions of South East Asia and Tibet. The third doco, ‘Vajra Sky over Tibet’, was theatrically released in the US in 2006.
Ó'Céilleachair is also founder of Ocularis - a Brooklyn based weekly cinema forum and registered not-for-profit company in the state of New York. Ocularis was recently the subject of a 10-year retrospective screening at New York’s Museum of Modern Art.
The residency will also see the filmmaker research his feature documentary ‘Amhrán an tSuláin’ (Sullane Song), set to shoot in Muskerry later this year. Produced by Martina Durac from Loopline Films, the film will trace the path of the Sullane river through the village of Coolea, Ballyvourney and Macroom, while focusing on three generations of women who live on the river’s banks. The doco will feature original music composed by Peadar Ó Riada.
