Ailís Ní Ríain Receives £50k Paul Hamlyn Award

The 2016 Paul Hamlyn Awards recipients, with Ailís Ní Ríain (centre). Photo: Emile Holba.

Ailís Ní Ríain Receives £50k Paul Hamlyn Award

'No-strings-attached' awards designed to give artists the time and freedom to develop their creative ideas.

The Paul Hamlyn Foundation in London has announced that Irish composer Ailís Ní Ríain is one of the recipients of the Awards for Artists 2016, with a value of £50,000 each.

Awards for Artists was launched in 1994 and are the largest individual awards made to composers and visual artists in the UK

Ní Ríain (b. 1974) is a Cork-born contemporary classical composer and stage writer. Currently based in Yorkshire, she is a regular collaborator with artists in other artforms. Among Ní Ríain’s most recent compositions are Skloniŝte (2015), a solo accordion and video homage to the people who survived the Siege of Sarajevo, 1992–1996. The Irish Times described it as ‘truly evok[ing] a strong response.’ Skloniŝte will be performed at this year’s Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival on 21 November, followed by further performances in Manchester, Bradford and Birmingham.

Ní Ríain has also completed commissions for the Royal Irish Academy of Music, The Bronte Society and Feelgood Productions, with new commissions lined up for Spitalfields Festival, Temenos Ensemble and Manchester Opera Project. Her work has been performed in the US and across Europe. Alongside her work as a composer, Ní Ríain is a published stage writer with plays produced in the UK, Ireland, Germany and Sweden. 

Commenting on the award, Ní Riain, said

I am very grateful indeed to have been selected for this award. It comes at an important cross-roads for me as a creative artist and is something I feel honoured and proud to accept.

The full list of recipients (pictured above, from left to right) includes Cara Tolmie, Lucy Beech and Edward Thomasson, Rachel Reupke, Ní Ríain, Daniel Kidane, Heather Leigh (sitting), Lucy Skaer and Sonia Boyce. 

Paul Hamlyn was a music and book publisher and philanthropist. He founded Music for Pleasure records, the Paul Hamlyn Group and Octopus Publishing Group, and set up the Paul Hamlyn Foundation in 1987. He died in 2001.

For further details, visit https://goo.gl/UYGZjq

Published on 14 November 2016

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