THE STORIES OF migrants travelling across the Mediterranean sea on boats, or travelling in cramped conditions on trucks across the continent have become commonplace in recent weeks.
As the migrant crisis reaching breaking point in several countries, a group of art students are bringing the conditions people have been travelling in home to Galway, locking themselves in a shipping contained for the next 24 hour.
The eight people, including their lecturer and other volunteers, will spend the day in pitch-dark conditions with only the clothes they are wearing, a two litre bottle of water each, and a “very small” portable toilet.
There’s no sleeping bags or phones.
The Giddy Biddy Collective have put together the art installation, called Infinity, to promote social awareness of the migrant crisis and to “provoke a personal response from viewers”.
The concept was developed by the volunteers while working on the Galway 2020 European Capital of Culture bid team.
Team leader Patricia Philbin said: “We recognise the need for immediate consideration of this migration crisis and are sure that the Giddy Biddy’s remarkable dedication to art and to social issues with this project will spark a much-needed conversation and raise awareness at a local Galway level.”
The group inside the container is diverse, ranging from Ronan Scully who has worked with Irish charity Gorta and adopted one of his two children after seeing them locked in similar conditions in a shipping container to Conor Lane, who worked in two different orphanages in Romania in the early ’90s.
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