Person to Person:  I moved here as a teenager to study music and forged a life for myself in Cork

TELL us about yourself;

I’m an artist living in Cork. I work across disciplines such as sound art, field recordings, performance, composition, film, theatre, and visual art, and am the 2023/24 Music Network RESONATE Artist-In-Residence at Triskel Arts Centre.

I moved here as a teenager to study music in UCC in 2003, discovered experimental music, and that was it. I mostly introduce myself as a sound artist. To put it very simply, I work a lot with various types of microphones and recording devices, recording the sounds of materials and processes, and then I arrange those sounds in ways that feel right to me. 

I often amplify my body, my skin, my tongue, my hair and my saliva, or else I might record the sound of putting my body through various actions or stresses (pushing, dragging, digging, submerging, etc).

My residency at the Triskel culminates in a concert in Triskel Christchurch on April 13 and will be an audio-filmic collaboration with the critic and filmmaker Maximilian Le Cain.

Where were you born?

I was born in Galway and grew up in Tuam and Galway city. I left the west to study music at UCC when I turned 17 and I forged a life for myself here in Cork.

Where do you live?

Gurranabraher. The views of the city are unbeatable.

Family?

I come from a small family and have a 17-year-old daughter.

Best friend?

My partner Gordon. We’ve been holding down a transatlantic long-distance relationship for almost three years now. He’s the first and last person I speak to every day.

Earliest childhood memory?

I remember picking the foamy wallpaper next to my cot, enjoying the feeling of trailing in circles under my grandmother’s lampshade, letting the yellow fringing tickle my skin, discovering birds’ nests in my grandfather’s shed, the artificial vanilla smell of my doll’s toy ice cream cone, my first time seeing wood ears growing on trees and logs in the garden, and being certain that the tree fungi were always listening to me.

Where was your most memorable holiday?

It wasn’t a holiday, but back in February, 2020, myself and five friends travelled to Palestine to establish ACLAÍ Palestine, a community gym/movement space for the residents of the overcrowded and regularly tear-gassed Aida refugee camp in Bethlehem.

Witnessing first-hand the myriad of inhumane ways in which Israel maintains its brutal, illegal occupation throughout the West Bank was a sobering and life-altering experience.

We were over there at the same time as the killing and desecration of Muhammad al-Na’im and the many Israeli airstrikes on Gaza. I’ll never forget the register of injustice after injustice stacking up inside me. The dehumanisation, ethnic cleansing, genocide, and necroviolence we are currently witnessing in Gaza and the West Bank has been exacted on the Palestinian people for decades and it is so important to stand together, oppose this illegal occupation in every way we can, and be in solidarity with our Palestinian brothers and sisters now and always.

Favourite radio show?

I love when Donal Dineen is let loose on the airwaves. I’ve been really enjoying listening to him filling in for Ellen Cranitch on Vespertine on RTÉ Lyric Fm.

Favourite TV programme?

My daughter and I have a weekly ritual of watching Gilmore Girls together to decompress. I had always been vaguely aware of this show but only started watching it maybe a year ago. It’s about wholesome-ish, small-town and privileged WASP-y folks in New England, USA, but the script is packed full of the verbal equivalent of blink-and-you-miss-it references to literature and classic films from the ’30s-’50s...

Favourite restaurant?

Izz Cafe and Miyazaki.

Last book you read?

For research: Jean Piaget’s The Child’s Conception Of The World. For pleasure: What About This: Collected Poems of Frank Stanford.

Best book you read?

Hard to answer. There’s no ‘best’ but We Have Always Lived In The Castle by Shirley Jackson and Who Was Changed And Who Was Dead by Barbara Comyns both feel personally meaningful. Unsettling gothic women forever.

What is the last album you bought?

The debut OXN album from Claddagh Records. I collaborated with them for their Martello Tower livestream concert during lockdown and to this day it felt like one of the most special things I was ever lucky enough to have a hand in. Their album is beautiful and I can’t wait to see them again soon.

Favourite song?

The Falcons’ I Found A Love.

One person you would like to see in concert?

Charli XCX.

Morning person or night owl?

Morning. I’m a busy person, always working on a billion projects, and I try to strike a good balance with rest, cooking, gym, keeping all the plates spinning, etc, so I like to get up, tackle the day head on and make the very most of my waking hours. 

My partner lives in a time zone eight hours behind me so night time is usually a good time to rest and catch up with him.

Your proudest moment?

During the pandemic, I reported someone who had groomed and abused me. The subsequent investigation was a glacial three years. Though the Gardaí had submitted a solid book of evidence and felt certain we would go to trial, the DPP ruled there was ‘not enough evidence’ to prosecute. My experience of reporting child sexual abuse was brutalizing and I’m not the same person after it. It’s a profoundly shattering experience. The system is stacked against survivors but I’m still proud of myself for having summoned and sustained the courage to report him, and that I am still standing today even though no accountability or justice came of it. 

My sincere thanks to Mary Crilly, the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre and One in Four for supporting me throughout those years, and good luck to anyone who is walking that road right now. “I don’t know no shame.”

Name one thing you would improve in your area in which you live?

I live on the 202 bus route and buses serving it are constantly cancelled. It’s not uncommon to see two or sometimes three bus-loads worth of passengers (older people, people with disabilities, young families) waiting at Merchants Quay for buses that never appear. Sort it out!

What makes you happy?

Because we live nearly 5,000 miles apart, my partner and I only get to see each other every five months or so. Being in his company is what makes me happiest.

What else are you up to at the moment?

I am currently researching theatre for very early years (0-12 month olds), training to be an SNA, training in suicide prevention, collaborating with various artists, a little bit of teaching, learning more about natural wine, studying cheese, learning to drive, and many other things.

Vicky Langan is the Music Network RESONATE Artist in Residence with Triskel Arts Centre. The live performance of the new work she is creating as part of the residency is on Saturday, April 13 at 8pm. Tickets from www.triskelartscentre.ie