This episode of the Fermynwoods Contemporary Art Podcast features Tread softly because you tread on my dreams, by Irish artist and writer Sarah Long. While the title carries a tongue-in-cheek tone, much like Sarah’s broader body of work, it also captures a quietly sparkling sentiment of love, light, and the intertwining of bygone pasts and potential futures.
Through its poetic and fluid narrative, this work invites listeners into the inner world of Mary, an autofictional character navigating her dreams and strange visions. Sarah deftly weaves these visions with the rich tradition of the aisling, an Irish poetic genre where the nation appears to the poet in a dream in the form of a woman.
Mary’s dreams offer a critique of inherited language and storytelling systems, while highlighting themes and motifs that reverberate throughout Irish culture such as the impact of colonialism, Celtic mythology and an affinity with the land.
Following the presentation of the work, Sarah engages in a fascinating discussion about her creative practice, inspirations, and the broader themes she explores in her work.
A short transcript of the episode is available here.
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The accompanying visual is a video response to the episode, by artist Sapphire Goss.
Sarah Long is an Irish artist and writer whose practice spans painting, text and performance. Sarah focuses on suppressed female archetypes, nationhood and myth, and positions the body in the tradition of landscape to contest the historical male gaze. She’s interested in embodying the patriarchal Mother Ireland literary figure, particularly Mother Ireland’s ability to house contrasting visions, and probes the potential for expanded thinking around the construct of the female condition. Her debut novella W/w was published by Bloomers in 2024. This autofiction work follows the trials and triumphs of an aspiring artist and writer and repositions the female figure away from cultural symbols and towards cultural makers. Her work was selected for Periodical Review 14, organised by Pallas Projects/Studios, Dublin (2024). Upcoming solo shows include South Tipperary Arts Centre (2025).
Our curators for the Love + Light season of the Fermynwoods Podcast are Marie-Chantal Hamrock and Astrid Björklund. Marie and Astrid have previously collaborated as SUBTERRA for Aerial Community Radio in Aberdeen, which “navigates speculative narratives of the chthonic (of relating to or inhabiting the underworld) through text, poetry, soundscapes and music.”
Sapphire Goss is a multimedia artist who uses obsolete technologies to explore experimental materiality and hybrid collaborative forms to make work that grows, decays and lives beyond the screen. Sapphire responds to each podcast episode with a new video.