From South Africa to Cork... building a new life and business Leeside

A NATIVE of South Africa, Emma McNally Jacobs relocated to Cork at the age of 51 with her family and, despite the challenges of starting over, she’s now looking forward to her first solo art exhibition here as well as launching her own business.

A first-generation South African, raised by an Irish father and Welsh mother, Emma moved to Ireland with her family in 2021.

The family were well-known, well-respected, well-established and regarded as industry leaders in hospitality in Durban.

In 2002, her husband Nic and herself exited their corporate roles and started their entrepreneurial journey. When the pandemic hit, they owned three art-themed B&Bs in Durban and her Emma Jacobs Art Gallery.

Emma, an established artist, was on the board of the National Accommodation Association, a committee member of Kwa-Zulu Natal Women in Business, and on various B&B Association committees. Their lives were very much entrenched in South Africa.

“But when lockdown followed, owning three hospitality businesses left us in a very difficult and traumatic situation. 

The only money that was safe, was the profits from the sale of my paintings, which I had in a separate bank account. That money is what we used to  emigrate and set up a frugal existence when we arrived.

Emma, her son and daughter have Irish passports, and she said it was a logical choice to come to Ireland and provide a future for themselves.

“We liked the idea of Cork, a city, but not as big as Dublin, and because it is a university town, we felt this would be more suitable for our children.

“In mid-June, 2021, my son Aidan and I came, did our mandatory hotel quarantine at Croke Park Hotel, my daughter Aimée joined a month later.

“Due to the riots in Durban in July, 2021, the sale of our main B&B collapsed, leaving my husband there. We decided to keep trading with the B&B, and Nic joined us in January, 2022.

“Even though we are Irish citizens, our children have to be resident for three years in Ireland to be eligible for Irish fees. As I could not afford international fees, our son is enrolled as an electrical engineering apprentice, and our daughter has been working for Bank of Ireland.

We live rural in Ballinhassig, between Halfway and Crossbarry, with beautiful views with our two Scottish terriers.”

Until recently, Emma was the people and culture manager at The Montenotte Hotel, successfully combining her hospitality and HR backgrounds. However, she’s shortly moving full-time into Arts Management and developing her own Emma Jacobs Art Practice.

“I have been awarded the contract for the role of STAMP 2024 Festival Manager and look forward to coordinating this annual art event in collaboration with Sample-Studios, Benchspace, Cork Craft and Design and Shandon Studios, which will be taking place at The Triskel Arts Centre in May.

“I am also currently enrolled at MTU Crawford Art and Design, doing a Drawing and Painting from Life course. It’s fun to have a student number for the first time in 31 years!”

Her solo exhibition opened on March 28 and will run until May 17, at the Hideout Café and Art Gallery owned by Agnieszka Stawosz, on Wellington Road, where she will have over 30 pieces of original artworks on exhibition.

“This solo exhibition is the transition from coming through the pandemic, emigrating, and reinventing and re-establishing our family in our new home country,” said Emma, who said they had a very different lifestyle in South Africa.

“We own a big house with the B&B, 11 bedrooms, 10 bathrooms, a large garden and swimming pool. It was a very different climate being in the Southern Hemisphere, and Christmas Day could hit 42 degrees Celsius. Eating out is very much part of the culture, as is inviting friends and family to one’s home for a ‘braai’ (barbeque).

To leave all of this, cut all roots and ties and start all over again, was not going to be easy.

However, South Africa has other challenges such as no electricity for multiple 2-hour slots daily, failing infrastructure affecting roads and water supply, crime and corruption.

“We lived with comprehensive nets of security protocols and that was regarded as normal,” she said.

Cork is now starting to feel like home.

“People keep asking me, for example, if I am going home for Christmas or for my holidays? I tell them… we are home.

“We are very grateful for the opportunity that Ireland has given us. We are much more settled now, three years on, and once we are able to live in a village or town, we will feel a stronger sense of belonging and being part of the Irish community

“We miss our home country terribly, of course, but have fallen in love with Ireland and are grateful for the chance at being able to reinvent ourselves through tenacity and perseverance,” she said.

For more see: https://emmajacobsart.com/