DRILL, Solo Exhibition, VISUAL, Carlow, 2026

 DRILL, 2026. DOP: Jenny Brady, Camera: Barry Lynch. Features: Sean McDonagh, Niall McDonagh, Abigail Sex, Nóra Ní Anluain Fay, Ben Sullivan, Gokul Nath Ilangovan and Jundai Roche.

In sport, the coach trains the team using a drill, honing movement and skills to muscle memory. Athletes repeat and perfect a sequence of actions that can be applied with high level efficiency on the track, in the field, on the court, in the arena, or in the pool. Knowing the drill, as a term, is more widely used to gain knowledge around a system and successfully navigating it. Doing a drill in an organised way prepares us for the unexpected, an emergency - leaving a building quickly or disembarking a plane if it crashes. Drilling down can be metaphorically applied as well as referring to an actual power drill. This solo exhibition will take Drill as a title and these multiple meanings as a backdrop for a newly commissioned body of work. 

In my artistic practice, I write micro short scripts, in tandem with the writing, I play with, amend, manipulate a chosen material that in some way compliments the content of the scripts. Usually, the material is something from my life. For example, I play badminton, it has ancient, non-western and colonial histories - as a consequence the resistance band (used in the sport) has become a motif and material in this body of work. When actors workshopped and performed the scripts, the resistance band then became a prop, a costume piece and functioned as a sculptural device, garnering a cast of actors, dancers and extras. 

The theory of language continues to remain a strong influence on the scripted material. The micro format of the scripts aims to distil focus and audience attention span. Performative “speech acts” are specific theoretical references i.e. “doing speech acts”, such as promises, apologies, dares or bequests. Theorists (e.g. J.L. Austin, Judith Butler, Eve Sedgewick Kosofsky) agree performative “speech acts” have the capacity to shift realty. The classic example of this is the marriage declaration, “I hereby take you to be my…”, Butler and Sedgewick detach it from Austin’s 1950’s heteronormative context, however, both agree that a couple’s lives ultimately shift by publicly declaring this commitment to each other. 

Ideas of commitment, goals and drives combine with performance to operate as offbeat, contemporary vignettes articulating the split seconds between decision and indecision and destabilising ideas of commitment to relationships, self-care and taste; an example is the piece entitled “Hundred Percent” which begins the sequence of work. The multiple screens relay the work, attempting to fragment any kind of narrative - instead aiming for spatial and bodily connections to the ideas running through the show. I worked closely with collaborator, Karl Burke on the sound design for the show. Burke developed a unique modulator system and methodology for the sound design. He applied this methodology to the scripted dialogue producing a harmonising and contradictory sound scape for the show. The performances are influenced by the body; proximity and mobility form a counterpoint to the dialogue attempting to create tensions, and perhaps, undermine the certainty of the drill.