What If We Were Brilliant? is a hopeful and creative project by Brilliant Ballybunion and artist Lisa Fingletonthat explores how communities can be “brilliant not brutal” in the face of biodiversity loss and climate change. Through art, storytelling, and community collaboration, the project invites audiences at Earth Rising 2025 to envision sustainable futures. Key elements include an immersive drawing and film installation, a participatory workshop on “The Future We Want to Be,” and a conversation panel featuring Dr Joanne O’Brien (ecologist), Lisa Fingleton, and local collaborators. The project will also feature the Ring Plover project, exploring local birdlife through soundscapes and drawings, and a new moving image work, Every Loss Matters, inspired by local biodiversity. Rooted in deep community engagement and creative climate action, What If We Were Brilliant? asks audiences to imagine new, more connected ways of living — with nature and each other.

This work is supported by the Creative Ireland Creative Climate Action Fund and the Kerry Visual Artist in Residence Programme (Arts Council and Kerry County Council)

Bearing Witness | Holding Space | Making Injury Visible is a powerful project from Interface Inagh, exploring the environmental and cultural impact of offshore wind farms on Ireland’s coastal communities. Led by artists Jane Cassidy and Laney Mannion, alongside ecologist Marie Louise Heffernan and curator Alannah Robins, the project centres on the proposed wind farm at Sceirde Rocks, Connemara.

Through immersive sound and light installations, participatory workshops, and seabird mapping, the project invites audiences to engage with the delicate balance between renewable energy and marine biodiversity. Visitors will interact with a tactile, immersive installation to activate recordings of seabird calls, explore migration paths, and print woodcut stories based on local folklore.

Urgent and thought-provoking, the project celebrates the unique richness of Ireland’s marine ecosystems—true jewels of its biodiversity. At the same time, it critically examines the industrialisation of our seas. Amplifying the voices of coastal communities, it encourages a national conversation about sustainable climate action that protects both ecosystems and cultural heritage.

Skate + Forage is an innovative and playful project led by Samuel Arnold Keane and Elida Maiques that explores the intersection of urban foraging and skateboarding. The project invites skateboarders, cyclists, and rollerbladers to forage their way through Dublin’s city centre en route to IMMA for Earth Rising 2025. Guided by Samuel’s expertise in foraging and the herbal knowledge of the Dublin Herb Bike team, participants will discover the hidden bounty of plants thriving in the cracks of the urban landscape. Visual artist Elida Maiques will help document the experience through sketches, creating a collective map that reimagines Dublin’s green spaces as vital elements of city life.

Photographer Pablo Marín García will capture the movement and energy of the journey, highlighting the connection between play, nature, and sustainable urban living. Skate + Forage encourages participants to reimagine urban spaces as places of growth and nourishment, fostering a deeper connection to the city and its wild edges.