what makes a man IN A VAN

Building bridges through beats

What Makes a Man is a workshop series that is being facilitated in Oberstown Youth Detention Centre by spoken word artist Geoff Finan. Working closely together over a series of workshops, Geoff with a group of young men from Dublin city will create a new spoken word performance piece that questions and subverts ideas of modern day masculinity.

This project builds bridges across generations by inviting the young artists to use as creative inspiration for their new work interviews with men across different decades.

The project will culminate in a one-day tour from the Festival in a Van stage visiting Oberstown and Dublin City Libraries.

What Makes a Man is funded by the Arts Council with support from Dublin City Libraries. The project is produced by Festival in a Van in collaboration with Oberstown Youth Detention Centre. Festival in a Van is also grateful to Gaisce for their support.

About the lead artist

Geoff Finan was the Writer in Residence for Dublin City Council for the Dublin Northwest area in summers 2018 and 2019. He was one of the coordinators for Poetry Town in Dublin 1 and is currently lecturing in poetry at NCAD and Maynooth.

In 2019 he wrote the 100-year commemorative poem celebrating the first Dáil in Ireland, 'January 1919', which was recently archived by The National Library of Ireland.

Geoff was commissioned by First Fortnight to write the poem 'Gloke' in collaboration with the Travelling community, having worked closely with the group for 4 months. DCC Culture Connects commissioned him to write for the Local Heroes initiative. His poem 'A Letter to Leo' was chosen as the flagship piece for the My Name Is campaign, fighting against child homelessness in Ireland.