Updated 10.48am

A CORK ARTS centre based in a city-centre building is fighting to keep its home after it was put on the market by NAMA.

The Camden Palace Hotel Community Arts Centre is based in the Camden Palace building in Cork city. In the past few years the former business has gone from private ownership to being taken over by NAMA, and is now on the market.

Petition

This weekend, the centre volunteers went on the streets of Cork to gather signatures for a petition – which is also online – and general manager, artist Eoin Gallagher, said they anticipate having a total of 2000 signatures by Christmas.

The centre has been open for five years, and during that time the team have taken over and transformed a crumbling old building and created several artists’ studios, a darkroom, an exhibition space, a recording studio, and other resources for people in the Leeside area.

It is run as a not-for-profit venture and is staffed by volunteers. They now want NAMA to help them remain in the building by extending their lease. Currently, they have a lease until next August.

“Being sold for peanuts”

Gallagher said the “building was crumbling and the roof falling in” when it was taken over by the artists, spearheaded by Bertrand Perennes.

“The building itself is a city centre location, and somewhere easily identifiable,” said Gallagher of why they want to remain there.  He also noted that they have built multiple facilities thanks to investment.

Though he said that they are not afraid of starting over again, given the opportunities the building represents to the community, and artists, “we just don’t want to let it go”.

“We’re fighting for it,” he said. “We love everything about it but at the end of the day if it comes to making a decision it is really going to be about protecting our artists and protecting our mission statement.”

He said a point they want to make is that a building “that was worth millions is now being sold for peanuts”.

They are in talks with the Cork City Council and the Arts Council to obtain their support during this time, and so that when they speak to NAMA they are “taken seriously”.

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