IMMA Announces Full Programme for Earth Rising 2025 and Signs Up to Culture Declares Emergency

The Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) is delighted to announce the full programme for the fourth Earth Rising festival, taking place from 12 -14 September 2025 on the grounds of IMMA at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham. All events are free of charge, with some requiring advance booking. Full programme details and booking links are now available at imma.ie.

Established in 2021, Earth Rising is Ireland’s leading festival exploring the intersection of climate, culture, and collective action. Presented by IMMA, the festival invites audiences to engage with the big questions of our time through the lens of art, creativity, and community.

Coinciding with the launch of the 2025 programme, IMMA is also announcing that it has officially signed up to Culture Declares Emergency, becoming the first major cultural institution in Ireland to do so. This global movement calls on the cultural sector to respond to the climate and ecological crisis with urgency, imagination, and solidarity.

Festival Overview

This year’s festival is inspired by Staying with the Trouble, IMMA’s current acclaimed group exhibition based on Donna Haraway’s influential text. The exhibition and the wider festival explore how we might live differently in a time of planetary breakdown, not by turning away from complexity, but by staying with it, together.

From radical talks to joyful workshops, restorative installations to grassroots action, Earth Rising 2025 features over 50 free events designed to inspire, connect, and activate.

Programme Highlights

TALKS: A compelling series exploring climate justice, sustainable fashion, civic imagination, and ecological care. Contributors include author Jon Alexander; climate justice advocate Seán McCabe (Bohemians FC); climate expert Fionnuala Moran; ecologist and surfer Easkey Britton; artist john gerrard; and Professor John Barry (Queen’s University Belfast).

MUSIC: Curated by Hen’s Teeth, the music programme showcases a wide range of Irish artists including Negro Impacto, Mohammed Syfkhan, Ispíní na hÉireann, EFÉ, Hewan Mulugeta, and Donal Dineen.

WORKSHOPS: Take part in the joyful and subversive Skate + Forage tour through Dublin’s edible greenways; swap and mend your wardrobe at Change Clothes Dublin; and create wearable art with Shock of Grey’s jewellery workshops.

FILM: Enjoy daily outdoor screenings on Living Canvas at IMMA, Europe’s largest digital outdoor art screen presented at IMMA by IPUT Real Estate. Screenings include the Irish premier of Black Butterflies; the cult visual masterpiece Koyaanisqatsi and the award-winning animated film Flow, presented in partnership with the Dublin International Film Festival.

ART: Enjoy in-depth, themed tours of IMMA’s major exhibitions, including Staying with the Trouble, IMMA Collection: Art as Agency, and the much-loved Kith + Kin: The Quilts of Gee’s Bend.

For the first time in Ireland, The Court for Intergenerational Climate Crimes (CICC) will be presented in Ireland. Step inside a powerful art-activist tribunal putting the British East India Company on trial for environmental destruction. Created by Radha D’Souza and Jonas Staal, this striking installation in IMMA’s Great Hall runs daily, with a live artist talk on Saturday 13 September.

OPEN CALL PROJECTS: Four ambitious, community-rooted commissions will premiere at Earth Rising:

What If We Were Brilliant? – Lisa Fingleton & Brilliant Ballybunion

Dinnseanchas – Hometree & artists William Bock, Síomha Brock, Zoë Rush, Heather Griffin, Patrick Mulvihill, Peadar-Tom Mercier, Róisín de Buitléar, Grace Wells, Jennifer Ahern, Aindrias de Staic, João Tudella, and Myriam Riand.

Bearing Witness | Holding Space – Interface Inagh – Jane Cassidy, Laney Mannion, Marie Louise Heffernan, and Alannah Robins.

Skate + Forage – Samuel Arnold Keane, Elida Maiques & Pablo Marín García.

Commenting Annie Fletcher, IMMA Director, said: “Earth Rising is a space where difficult realities and radical hope can coexist. In 2025, we’re not only deepening our commitment to these conversations through our festival programming but we’re also taking a clear stand by joining Culture Declares Emergency. IMMA is proud to be the first major Irish institution to do so. This reflects our belief that culture must be central to how we understand, navigate, and respond to the climate and ecological crisis.”

The 2025 Earth Rising festival will be officially launched at a public reception at 6pm on Thursday 24 July at IMMA, featuring music by Big Cheeks, refreshments by Fruition, and a preview of what is to come. All are welcome.

Explore the full programme and book your place at www.imma.ie.

The festival is kindly supported by the Department of Culture, Communications & Sport and Philip Lee LLP, Earth Rising Pollinator Sponsor 2025.

Collaborations and partnerships remain at the heart of Earth Rising 2025. IMMA is proud to work with partners including Bohemians FC in collaboration with IMMA Members; Dublin International Film Festival; Hen’s Teeth; IPUT Real Estate; Native Events; Office of Public Works; Scouting Ireland; The Great Oven; and Holyshow.

24 July 2025

ENDS

For media inquiries, interviews, or additional information, please contact:
Patrice Molloy E: [email protected] T: 086 2009957
Monica Cullinane E: [email protected] T: 086 2010023

Additional Notes

About Culture Declares
Culture Declares is a growing movement of individuals and organisations worldwide involved in arts and culture who are declaring a climate and ecological emergency. Its mission is to support and mobilise a global movement of declarers in the cultural sector to take action and inspire others. https://www.culturedeclares.org/