The Eco Showboat Expedition 2022

The Eco Showboat Mayfly expedition is a four-month arts voyage from Limerick to Enniskillen on the Mayfly, the flagship of the Eco Showboat project, and the first solar-electric boat to make this journey. (Expedition Map here)

Over the May bank holiday weekend, artists Anne Cleary and Denis Connolly invite you to celebrate the launch of the Mayfly with a weekend of events at the Curraghour Boat Club(April 30th) and at the Hunt Museum (May 1st) in Limerick for Riverfest (Limerick Programme here).

Eco Showboat Expedition

The boat will then set out from the former Customs House Quay in Limerick, travelling upstream throughout the summer to develop conversations about climate change with communities along the waterways during a series of Eco Sundays – waterside events bringing together local artists, scientists, farmers and community activists (Programme here).

20 artists have been commissioned through the project to make work that engages with climate change. The Mayfly’s voyage will be a discovery of these artists and their work (participating artists here).

Waterside Art and STEM workshops, as well as talks and exhibitions, will take place in an artist-designed sculptural pop-up space, the Pangolin Pavilion, constructed from repurposed beach parasols.

The Mayfly is small solar and wind-powered yacht. The boat, a mobile work of art hand-painted by the artists, will carry a joyful message about climate action throughout the country. The artists are concurrently working to convert a century-old steel canal barge, the 48M, to a carbon-neutral floating centre for creative climate initiatives, spearheaded by the arts community working hand in hand with the scientific community.

The project has received the Arts Council Open call Award for 2021, as well as an SFI Discover Award, the Limerick Arts Strategic Award, and is supported by Creative Ireland, Waterways Ireland, Dublin City Council, the Local Authority Waters Programme and local authorities and universities right across the country (full list of partners here).