Young Soldier by Adam Mohamed

Every month, we’re publishing a new work in partnership with RTÉ Culture. In the latest installment, Project presents the work of artist Adam Mohamed, as part of the Short Cuts programme.

Project has invited a number of artists, curators, and social activists, with a lived experience of intersectional discrimination, to discuss their practice and share ambitious and provocative new work, encouraging crucial dialogue around the impact of social and economic inequality.

Adam Mohamed is an Irish-Sudanese Poet & Musician from Ballymun, Dublin. Adam released Untitled, his debut work, in 2020, which took the form of a spoken word short film, detailing the complexities of growing up mixed race, and mixed religion in one of Ireland’s ‘most infamous’ working class communities. The piece was selected as an RTÉ 2fm track of the week and went viral throughout Ireland and the UK in early 2021, gaining over 300k social media views and 12K YouTube hits and eventually ending up on the Junior Cycle School curriculum.

Since 2020 Adam has moved seamlessly between spoken word, poetry and rap, and is fresh off the summer festival circuit, where he performed at Forbidden Fruit, All Together Now and most recently, as part of the Africa Under Irish Skies tent at Electric Picnic.

When talking about his new work Young Soldiers, Adam describes his initial inspiration for the piece. ‘I was thinking about Ulysses and how it describes an ordinary day. I thought it would be interesting to apply that style of writing to life in “rough areas” like my community of Ballymun, without romanticizing or glorifying drugs or violence. In the end, I settled on producing a strategy or guide for people navigating their way through life in these parts. Because if you don’t make the right choices, or surround yourself with the right people, then things can go South very quickly. Then how do you survive or make it home? ’

Adam was selected as part of the Shortcuts Programme which aims to give artists working in digital formats the opportunity to platform their work and receive mentorship around funding opportunities and career development.

Listen to an exclusive clip of Adam’s new commission for Project Arts Centre, Young Soldier, due to be released in early 2023: