Axis Ballymun announces 2025 Assemble Artists, championing bold and diverse creative voices
Axis Ballymun has announced the 2025 cohort of artists selected for its Axis Assemble programme, a five-month creative bursary designed to support and nurture emerging and established talent in the Greater Dublin area. This year’s line-up features a dynamic group of artists working across theatre, spoken word, visual art, dance, cabaret, multimedia, and immersive performance.
Now in its second year, Axis Assemble offers each artist a €2,000 bursary along with tailored in-kind support that includes rehearsal and development space, dramaturgical and creative mentorship, hot desk facilities, production advice, technical support, and networking opportunities. The programme has become an important fixture for independent artists seeking to develop new work with community-focused, innovative, and cross-disciplinary approaches.
The 2025 artists reflect the diversity and vibrancy of Ireland’s contemporary arts scene. Among them is Cormac Mac Gearailt, the current All-Ireland Poetry Slam Champion and Slamovision UNESCO Cities of Literature Champion, who will develop a bilingual theatre piece addressing intergenerational trauma, language loss, addiction, and heritage. Writer and performer Susannah Al Fraihat will expand her acclaimed ‘Fruit series’ with Forbidden Fruit, continuing her exploration of migration and cultural identity using humour and metaphor.
Actor and theatre maker Laura Brady will work on Adelphi ’63, a new play inspired by The Beatles’ only Irish concert and its surrounding social context. Meanwhile, circus artist Charli Sweet will continue developing an immersive piece inspired by open-world storytelling and escape room formats, and visual artist Jen Harrington will investigate fungi as a metaphor for community and resilience in Ballymun.
Several theatre makers are using the programme to delve into urgent contemporary issues. Trudy Nolan’s immersive semi-verbatim piece Quick Pick examines chronic illness in the Irish public healthcare system. Eimear Hussey’s Threadcrumbs will explore fast fashion and sustainability, informed by interviews and workshops with young people and workers in the clothing industry. Amy Kidd will expand her sharp-edged romantic comedy This Is Not a Rom-Com, and Sinéad Mooney will craft a darkly comic play about housing, dereliction, and the millennial condition.
The programme also welcomes the collaborative energy of collectives and interdisciplinary duos. The Prima Donna Collective, led by Luka Costello and Conrad Jones Brangan, will workshop their new cabaret piece There Will Be No Muppets, while clown and cabaret performer Maria Cunningham, one half of Lipstink, will begin a new three-hander play informed by her queer, neurodivergent practice.
The 2025 group includes several artists who have previously been recognised through major national institutions and festivals, such as Fishamble, Dublin Fringe, The Abbey, Scene + Heard, and Cork Midsummer. Their work spans genres and styles but shares a commitment to authenticity, experimentation, and the value of storytelling as a tool for understanding social issues, identity, memory, and imagination.
Axis Assemble continues to position Axis Ballymun as a key creative hub for artists across Dublin and beyond. In a city grappling with rising costs and limited arts infrastructure, the programme offers not only resources, but a supportive, collaborative community for artists to take creative risks, deepen their practice, and present bold new work.
For more on Axis Assemble and its artists, visit axisballymun.ie.
