ÁINE MACKEN, FOUNDER OF ART CLASH, DESCRIBES THE MOTIVATION BEHIND THIS ONGOING SERIES OF CREATIVE CLASSES.

 

Art Clash began as a creative experiment, where contemporary nightlife became a platform for utilising and incorporating creativity and talent in a visual art context.

After much experience in art making, I was left with the very real awareness of the difficulty in making money through traditional art practice. The idea of attempting to apply creativity to nightlife and the industrious world of clubbing became a slightly more exciting method of generating money than making sandwiches at a deli. Club nights such as Synth Eastwood openly encouraged an environment of creativity, art making and innovation. Pubs like The Bernard Shaw and U Bar in Christchurch, Dublin had a clear and apparent mission: to combine creativity with nightlife and to enter art making into a more accessible format. However, too frequently these events contained an obvious element of voyeurism rather than participation, where punters were permitted to gawp at an artist creating work as they supped a pint.

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