Save the date! Our annual Open Day is back on Sat 20 June from 11am – 5pm, packed full of free performances, workshops, talks, tours, music, dancing, food and more!
Open Day 2026
20 June 2026
Each year we swing open the doors of the building to give the public a real taste of what we do here at Project. No faff, no fuss. Just turn up, wander through each space and see where the day takes you.
We’ll have buzzing community vibes, delicious food experiences, all combined with the best tunes from some of our favourite local DJs.
We will also be providing access supports and services to ensure that the programme is as accessible as possible.
Take a look at the line-up we have to date, and keep an eye out for more announcements of your returning favs and some fresh faces…
Ciarán O’Keefe / Smilin’ Kanker
Smilin’ Kanker will sing a cycle of love songs across the building on the Open Day and deliver a spoken word response to Liliana Zeic’s Eating the Sun exhibition, currently showing in the Project Gallery.
Ciarán O’Keeffe / Smilin’ Kanker is a writer and spoken word performance artist.
More about the Artist
Recent highlights include the publication of his memoir notes on love and desire (2026), a lead role in the short Irish language short film Idir Dhá Thrá, directed by Carson Honor (2026), a performative reading from his memoir as part of Parallels (Carnegie Library, Dun Laoghaire, 2026), and performing in Mark O’Halloran’s two-hander Trade (Samuel Beckett Theatre, 2024). His solo dance piece, Dance Alone (NCAD Gallery, 2021), was selected by Pallas Studios’ Periodical Review as one of the significant art works of 2021. In 2014, for his solo play, An Insignificant Man, he received a Best Performer Nomination at the Dublin Fringe Festival. As Smilin’ Kanker, he was crowned Alternative Miss Ireland in 2009. He has presented work at IMMA, RHA, Temple Bar Galleries, Project Arts Centre, the Olympia Theatre, Smock Alley, Electric Picnic, Workmans Club, Sugar Club and throughout the UK (including the National Theatre, London), New York, Amsterdam and Teramo, Italy.
D’Girlos Theatre
D’Girlos Theatre will present a condensed performance of their award-winning play That’s Sooo Povo.
D’Girlos Theatre Company was founded in 2025 by best friends Sophie O’Toole and Trudy Nolan, two working-class theatre makers who saw no space for themselves in the industry and decided to build their own. Dedicated to creating authentic working-class art, D’Girlos amplifies voices too often overlooked while creating more opportunities for women in technical and production roles.
More about the Artists
D’Girlos exists for those who were never given the chances they deserved. It’s for the ones who were overlooked, underestimated, or told they didn’t belong. This is your space, your stage, your moment. It’s a chance to take the girl in the juicy tracksuit seriously. D’Girlos made their debut at Dublin Fringe Festival 2025 with That’s Sooo Povo, a sold-out production nominated for both Best Production and the Solas Nua New Voices Award. The show also earned Trudy Nolan the Next Stage Fringe Wildcard Award.
Trudy Nolan, from Tallaght, is an actor and theatre maker with a focus on immersive theatre, movement, and socially engaged performance. A first-class honours graduate of TU Dublin’s BA Drama (Performance), she was also a 2025 Dublin Theatre Festival Next Stage participant and Axis Assemble Bursary recipient.
Sophie O’Toole, from Crumlin, is an actor, writer, and theatre maker. A graduate of the TUD Conservatoire and an Axis Assemble Artist 2024, her work explores class, identity, and access within the arts. Alongside theatre-making, she has a strong interest in filmmaking, experimental storytelling, and drag performance.
Eating the Sun Gallery Tour
Alongside Marysia Więckiewicz, Project’s Curator of Visual Arts, Pola Folwarczny will facilitate guided tours – both in English and Polish – of the first ever exhibition of Liliana Zeic’s work in Ireland, currently on show in the Gallery.
More about the Artists
Liliana Zeic
Liliana Zeic (Piskorska) (she/her they/them) – born in Poland in 1988, visual artist, PhD in fine arts. She is a finalist of the Forecast Forum in Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin in 2017 and the Audience Award Winner: Views 2019 in Zachęta National Gallery of Art. She has taken part in over 140 individual and group exhibitions in Poland and abroad. Her works are part of private and public collections (incl. NOMUS New Museum of Art, Zachęta National Gallery of Art, Wrocław Contemporary Museum, Municipal Gallery Arsenal, MS Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź). Based in Warsaw. She creates under the name Zeic since February 2021. Represented by gallery lokal 30.
Pola Folwarczny
Originally from Poland, Pola is an early-career creative professional, growing her practice in visual arts curation and event development. She is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in Cultural Policy and Arts Management at University College Dublin. She also holds a Bachelor’s degree in Liberal Arts and Sciences from the University of Amsterdam. Having just finished her internship at the Project Arts Centre, during which she assisted with the opening of Eating the Sun, she is excited to bring you all on a tour of Liliana’s astonishing work.
Fearghal Curtis
Fearghal will be set up at our Open Day with his podcast desk and mic to chat to people about their work, their creative process, their relationship to the arts and anything else they’d like to spill. All recordings will be combined together into one recording and kept for archival purposes. All are welcome to come and have a chat!
Fearghal is an opera singer, podcast producer and celebrant from Dublin. He is a graduate from D.I.T. Conservatory of Music and Drama, and the Royal Academy of Music, London. He was an Associate Young Artist with Opera Theatre Company and is a previous bursary recipient of the The International Opera Award.
More about the Artist
Fearghal has an interest in multi-disciplinary work which includes opera, theatre, dance, movement, and audio.
Most recent opera highlights include his most recent work with Irish National Opera in Rusalka, The Flying Dutchman and La Boheme.
Other opera and theatre highlights include ensemble for Michael Gallen’s new opera Elsewhere with Straymaker, which premiered at the Abbey Theatre, the Tenor Soloist in John Scott’s The Wanderer for Irish Modern Dance Theatre Company at The Cork Opera House, Singer/dancer for the Germany and American tour of The World of Musicals with GFD Productions, The Magic Flute (1st Armed Man/Chorus), Orfeo ed Euridice (Ensemble), The Second Violinist (Chorus), Tales of Hoffmann (Spalanzani/ Chorus), Eithne (Taoiseach/Chorus), Acis and Galatea (Acis/Ensemble), Orpheus and the Underworld (Orpheus/Mercury), The Turn of the Screw (Prologue and u/s Quint), Pygmalion (Pygmalion), La Rondine (Prunier), L’Orfeo (Apollo/Shepherd/Spirit), Gondoliers (Marco), Der Vampr (Georg), Cox and Box (Box), amongst others.
Fearghal launched his first podcast series Let’s Talk About The Arts in 2020, which is a safe space to uplift and support the arts industry and artists through important and open conversations. He has also produced and worked on many Irish podcast productions.
In 2022, Fearghal launched his own Cabaret evening, The Curtis Cabaret at The Sugar Club, Dublin to great success. Since its launch, The Curtis Cabaret has returned to The Sugar Club on multiple occasions for various themed evenings, the most recent being Queerly, Madly, Deeplyl celebrating queer identity.
He is a celebrant and solemniser with Entheos Ireland, and is known for his personal, fun and meaningful ceremonies for weddings, funerals and naming ceremonies.
He was named one of the Top 50 People to Watch for 2023 by Irish journalist Andrea Cleary for The Irish Times.
Tierra Porter – Gather & Sing Workshop
Gather & Sing led by Tierra Porter is a joyful workshop blending classical vocal training and gospel-rooted musicality with techniques from children’s theatre to make play, creativity, and communal music making accessible to adults of all experience levels.
Tierra is an interdisciplinary artist of African, Indigenous American , and Puerto Rican descent hailing from Cordele, Georgia . She is a recent First Class Honors Graduate from the Lir Academy (BA Acting).
More abut the Artist
Credits while studying at the Lir include: The Duchess of Berwick Lady Windermere’s Fan, Paulina A Winter’s Tale, Vera in Bulrusher, Delphine in Untitled and Sarah Worth in The Sugar Wife.
Previous to training: performed and directed for Missoula Children’s Theatre touring internationally.
Other roles include Ronette in Little Shop of Horrors, Rusty in Footloose at theStrand Theatre in Marietta, Georgia and Deloris Van Cartier in Sister Act at theMissoula Community Theatre in Missoula, Montana .
Upon Graduating: Gate stage in Roddy Doyle Adaptation of J.M Barrie’s Peter Pan.She went on to play Sarah Worth in the Sugar Wife at the Abbey National Theatre,Elena/Rita in The Jesus Trilogy adapted by Eoghan Quinn, Erica in Beards the Musical written by HK Ni Shriordan, Mom/Tierra in The Queer Messiah River Bank Arts/ National Theatre Writers’ Studio, Tituba The Crucible Gaiety Theatre.
Sarah-Jane O’Regan – ISL Disco
Experience music like never before through Irish Sign Language, visual storytelling, and interactive audience participation — whether you hear with your ears, your eyes, or your heart.
Sarah–Jane O’Regan is a performance interpreter and presenter passionate about experiencing music through multi-sensory approaches and Irish Sign Language.
More about the Artist
Through expressive performance interpreting, Sarah-Jane brings songs to life visually — allowing audiences, regardless of hearing levels, to see the words, feel the emotions, and experience music in a different way. Her interactive performances also teach audiences Irish Sign Language, turning participation into part of the show itself.
Dates & Times
Saturday 20 June
11am – 5pm
Tickets
Free to attend, no booking required
Space
Lower & Upper Foyer, Cube, Space Upstairs, Bar
Genres
Open Day
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