Mar 7: David Rankine; Sharon Doyle Driedger; Laura Hay; Lynn Hillary
David Rankine was born in Willowdale, Ontario (a suburb of Toronto) to Scottish parents and developed an early appreciation of Celtic culture and history. He received his Bachelor of Fine Arts at York University and it was there that David began to explore Celtic art and saw how closely it was connected to Celtic music and dance.
Since art school, David has sought to contemporize Celtic art and has been at the forefront of the Celtic art explosion in Ontario and North America. He has participated in numerous group and solo shows across Canada (including his own, ongoing A Rustle of Wings and Carpet Pages series).
David's teaching experience extends from formal instruction at York University( School of Nursing), Haliburton School of Fine arts ,Mohawk College, Cedar Ridge Art Centre (Toronto) and the Goderich Celtic college, to workshops and classes for primary and secondary level students . David also teaches professional development courses for teachers and other artists.
Every year David presents a number of lectures at various venues and to various audiences. His lecture: The Book of Kells, Dark Age Visions of the Divine was first presented at Tyndale College and the University of Toronto. His other lectures are: The Quiet World of the Mandala and Open Space Creativity
David's work can be found in collections throughout North America, Britain, Japan and Germany. His commercial art work extends to design and illustration work for books, CD covers, cards, posters, jewellery, rugs and recently, the design of a 14' stone High Cross in Winnipeg, Manitoba.
Sharon Doyle Driedger- An Irish Heart -How A Small Immigrant Community Shaped Canada
An Irish HeartDuring the Great Famine of the 1840s, thousands of impoverished Irish immigrants, escaping from the potato crop failure, fled to Canada on what came to be known as "fever ships." As the desperate arrivals landed at Quebec City or nearby Grosse Isle, families were often torn apart. Parents died of typhus and children were put up for adoption, while lucky survivors travelled on to other destinations. Many people made their way up the St. Lawrence to Montreal, where 6,000 more died in appalling conditions.
Despite these terrible beginnings, a thriving Irish settlement called Griffintown was born and endured in Montreal for over a century. The Irish became known for their skill as navvies, building our canals and bridges, working long hours in factories, raising large, close-knit families. This riveting story captures their strong faith, their dislike of authority, their love of drink, song and a good fight, and their loyalty.
Filled with personal recollections drawn from extensive author interviews, An Irish Heart recreates a community and a culture that has a place of distinction in our history. From D'Arcy McGee and Nellie McClung to the Montreal Shamrocks, Brian Mulroney and beyond, Irish Canadians have made their mark.
Lynn Hilary was born in Dublin, Ireland. Initially singing classical music,she moved to Celtic music. Among the singers who influenced here, she counts Michael Jackson, Joni Mitchell, and Karen Carpenter.
Lynn Hilary
She joined the Irish choral group Anúna in 2000, and recorded and performed with them until 2007. She toured the U.S.A., Morocco, the Netherlands, and Finland with the group. She is a featured soloist on four of their albums--Invocation, Winter Songs, Behind the Closed Eye, and Sensation. She performed the lead vocal of the piece "Cloudsong" from Riverdance at the Opening Ceremony of the 2003 Special Olympics in Croke Park, Dublin, and completed a tour with Riverdance in the U.S. in 2006 as a featured soloist.
She released a solo album called Take Me With You in 2008. Since then, she has toured with Celtic Woman as one of the soloists for the Isle of Hope tour and the ongoing show Songs from the Heart.
Laura Hay is coordinating the Ottawa Irish Festival on behalf of the Irish Society.
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Mar14: Rose of Tralee Entrants
Caitlin Callaghan NICCC RoseCaitlin Callaghan
Originally from Belleville Ontario and has been residing in Ottawa for the past 5 years to attend school. She is currently completing her degree in the Bachelor of Education program at the University of Ottawa. Caitlin can trace her Irish roots back to County Armagh as well as County Cork. She has been a competitive Irish dancer for the past 15 years and hopes to progress one day to teach it.
Fiona Duffy D'Arcy McGee Rose
Fiona DuffyA graduate from the BScN program, Fiona currently works as a Registered Nurse at the Ottawa General Hospital. Working in the Intensive Care Unit, she cares for the most critically ill patients. Fiona finds her job extremely rewarding and is privileged to work with such a great team of people. She spends her free time volunteering with Big Brothers Big Sisters of Ottawa, playing on a coed competitive volleyball team and training for her first 5k race in April. She loves going out dancing with friends, spending time with family, reading a good book and rollerblading by the canal. She first heard about the Rose of Tralee while in Ireland visiting family. While recovering from a collapsed lung in hospital, her 3 lovely roommates encouraged her take part in the festival. In the future she plans on traveling to new parts of the world, becoming fluent in French, continuing her education and running a marathon. Her father hails from Dublin and her mother from Maynooth, Co. Kildare.
Laura Hay Irish Society Rose
Laura Hay is first-generation Canadian, having grown up with her five siblings on the shores of Georgian Bay in Southern Ontario. Laura first moved to Canada's fair capital to attend the UniverLaura Haysity of Ottawa for a degree in history. She has also completed a Masters in history, looking at British perceptions of the Irish in the Late-Eighteenth Century. Currently, Laura works as a public servant at Indian and Northern Affairs Canada.
As a member of Ottawa's Irish community, Laura is taking both Irish language and dance classes, and is also the Cultural Chair for the Irish Society of the National Capital Region. In addition, Laura loves to spend what free time she has hiking, knitting, snowshoeing, watching BBC adaptations of classic literature, and reading - Jane Austen if at all possible.
Amy Lynch Heart & Crown Rose
Amy works for the Ottawa School of Art as their Marketing and Events Coordinator, and would eventually like to apply her communications skills while working abroad for a charitable organization. The 24-year-old has two Diplomas in Journalism and Advertising, and would liAmy Lynchke to obtain her Bachelor of Communications. She enjoys photography, event planning, writing letters the old fashioned way, playing baseball, and is an animal lover who grew up on a small dairy farm in Eastern Ontario. She loves to travel and is working on visiting each of her friends who live in faraway places one city at a time - so far she's been to London, Dublin, Cork, Galway, Daegu (SK), Busan (SK), New York, Victoria, Vancouver and hopes to visit St. John's, NFLD, Brisbane and Melbourne within the next year. She likes to volunteer in her spare time and has done so with the Canada Africa Community Health Alliance (CACHA), Ecology Ottawa, Glengarry Highland Games, HOPE Beach Volleyball and is an active participant in the annual Ottawa Weekend to End Women's Cancers. Amy's Mum is 5th Generation Irish from County Tipperary and her Dad is 6th Generation Irish from Counties Roscommon, Tyrone and Cork.
Mar 21 Declan Kelly, Toronto Irish Person of the Year feature
Some people have friends in high places. Other people are just friends who happen to be in high places. Ireland's Ambassador to Canada, Declan Kelly, certainly falls into the latter category. He's not just high because of his rank, but also because his Embassy office is on the 11th floor of a downtown Ottawa of nice building, not fur from Parliament Hill.
Mar 28:Cathal Lynch
Cathal Lynch left Dublin for 4 years in in Aug 1994 but didn't get back for 15 years (Aug 2009). While "on the road", he spent 11 years working in Brussels in various capacities related to the Institutions of the European Union, and another very different 4 years in Ottawa of free from "the tyranny of the workplace" back in school in the University of Ottawa. In their different ways, he says that those years "don't suppose either represented normality " but he is back to normality now it is in an Ireland not all that different in some ways from 1994 (eg. economic problems still, people not as changed as I had been led to believe etc), but very striking changes in other respects (eg. the new skyline of the capital, new infrastructure throughout the country etc). He says he is still catching up on all of it ...
