Galway International Summer School on the Arts and Human Rights – 9-11 July 2015

Belonging: Exploring the intersection between the arts and human rights 

The first Galway International Summer School on the Arts and Human Rights will take place from 9–11 July 2015 in National University of Ireland, Galway. Co-directed by Prof Michael O’Flaherty, Director of the Irish Centre for Human Rights and Dr Dominique Bouchard, Curator at the Hunt Museum, it will bring together arts practitioners with human rights activists and scholars to explore their shared space. Events will take the form of panel discussions, exhibitions and performances.

The global theme for 2015 will be “Belonging”. The Summer School will consist of keynote addresses, plenary discussions, and themed discussions on three parallel tracks – literature and human rights; the visual arts and human rights; and music and human rights. The opening speaker will be the United Nations Special Rapporteur for Cultural Rights, Farida Shaheed.

Other speakers and panelists include:

• Jennifer Johnston, Novelist, winner of the Whitbread book award;
• Manfred Nowak, Scientific Director of the Ludwig Boltzmann Institut für Menschenrechte, former United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture and judge at the Human Rights Chamber for Bosnia and Herzegovina;
• Susan McKay, Journalist;
• Sarah Joseph, Director of the Castan Centre for Human Rights Law, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia;
• Kateřina Šedá, Artist;
• Vincent Woods, Poet and playwright;
• Lelia Doolan, Film producer, former artistic director of the Abbey Theatre.
• Rita Duffy, Artist;
• Dominic Thorpe, Artist;
• Mary Lawlor, Front Line Defenders
• Neil Jarman, Institute for the Study of Conflict Transformation and Social Justice, Queen’s University Belfast;
• Barbora Bukovska, Senior Director for Law, Article 19;
• Vered Cohen Barzilay, Director, Novel Rights;
• Paul Seawright, Artist, Professor of Photography, University of Ulster;
• Bob Collins, Chairman of the Board of the Arts Council of Northern Ireland;
• Guido Gryseels, Director, Royal Museum for Central Africa, Brussels, Belgium;
• Rod Stoneman, Director, Huston School of Film & Digital Media, National University of Ireland, Galway;
• David Petrasek, Associate Professor, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, University of Ottawa, Canada;
• Julian Fifer, Musicians for Human Rights.

Registration costs €350, but a reduced early bird registration fee of €290 is available until 31 March 2015.

For more information please visit http://conference.ie/ or email artsandhumanrights@gmail.com.