ABOUT

Slipped, Fell and Smacked my Face off the Dance Floor

A live site-specific performance on 10th, 11th, 17th, 18th June 2022.
A 20 minute performance on a loop between 1-4pm each day.

Naylor’s Cove, Bray, Co. Wicklow.


Lisa Freeman’s new scripted performance work features actors, a saxophone player and a significant location: the once-busy sea bathing pool at Naylor’s Cove, Bray.

Drawing on the town’s history as a site of leisure and respite, this work positions the human body in this now-defunct site of relaxation. The actors create intimate moments of dialogue in this public space, where the script touches on ideas of therapeutic infrastructures, tourism and the body as an archive. These moments are woven through this site of failed architecture, set to a live musical score performed by a saxophone player.

Information on the work can be viewed on the Mermaid Arts Centres website here.

SCREENINGS OF SLIPPED... (THE FILM)


Festival ECRÃ, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, July 2023


aemi online, solo exhibition, October 2022 - January 2023  

RTÉ Culture, In The Picture: Lisa Freeman's Slipped, Fell and Smacked My Face off The Dance Floor, November 2022

CREDITS & THANKS



Performers; Biaina Ryan, Niamh McPhillips,Tadhg O’Rourke (Actors) Andrea Jones (Saxophone).

Presented by Mermaid Arts Centre

With thanks to; Temple Bar Gallery + Studios, Padraig Cunningham, Emma Conway, Jenny Sherwin, Julie Kelleher, Gerlanda Maniglia, Dennis McNulty, Anne Mullee, Astrid Newman, Claire Walsh, Dan Reidy, Lana May Fleming, Lauren Conway, Vera Ryklova.


Kindly supported by an Arts Council of Ireland Project Award, Wicklow County Council and Mermaid Arts Centre.


Photography by Louis Haugh


About Naylor’s Cove

Naylor’s Cove has a long history as swimming destination and is located just below the start of the popular Bray to Greystones cliff walk.

The Cove was named after local fisherman and boat builder Bart Naylor, who leased the land from Town Commissioners in the 1870s. He erected bathing boxes and a small pier, and the spot became a popular sea bathing spot. It fell into disrepair following Naylor’s death in the First World War, but was revived in the 1930s when Bray Urban Council built a small children’s swimming pool.

The spot became so popular that three further sea pools were built, and it remained busy until the advent of the package holiday in the late 1960s. In 2011, Bray Municipal Council removed the then derelict remaining structures leaving it in the condition it is in today.