Artists in residence
Once a year at Bank Holiday Weekend in June the K-Fest takes place in Killorglin. From Friday to Monday all kind of arts, from music to pop-up galleries take place in several venues. Despite high prices, hotels and guest houses are fully booked. So Markus and Frank had the idea of "artist in residence" to provide a room and catering for the festival time for free. Only, the artist has to leave a piece of the own art in the cottage.
"When exhibiting, you are most vulnerable as an artist. So Frank and I want to make sure, that our guests can focus on their exhibition and find a safe space to calm down after a turbulent day in the gallery. The best moment is, when we all sit together on our long table and talk about the day and the world itself."
Markus Ehrhard
Artist in residence 2024: lorcan cassidy, dublin
It is a wondeful story about Lorcan Cassidy from Dublin and what K-Fest is all about. Markus and Frank met Lorcan at the K-Fest 2022, he presented the Humunculus, a humanlike sculpture in latex. Lorcan did hide behind of one of the pillars in Boyles Hardware Hall and he observed the reactions of the visitors. He was in neighbourhood of Juilanne Guinee and Cara Cleary. After that K-Fest he went back home to Dublin full of ideas, but the year later, he got not selected. But Markus stayed in contact and bought of his drawings and his book about the sugar subject. And what great news when Lorcan and Markus got selected for K-Fest 2024 and without doubt, Markus and Frank offered Lorcan to become the "artist in residence" in 2024.
Having said that, the day before the opening, a truck from Dublin arrived at Railway Cottage full of colorfull fabric monsters.
At the venue, Lorcan presented an oustanding installation with these sculptures and a wall full of amazing drawings. What a wonderful development from the Humunculus to this modern presentation!
Artist in residence 2023: Cara Cleary, Potsdam
Dave Ryan, from the K-Fest Commity, once said to Markus on a Love Buzz concert: "K-Fest is about the people!"
Ok, this festival is about all kind of arts, from music to performance, from dance to visual art in pop-up galleries. But it are the artists, who create this certain atmosphere at K-Fest.
In 2022 Markus and Frank met Julianne Guinee at Boyles Hardware Hall. While talking, Cara Cleary arrived, she was Juliannes and Lorcan Cassidy's exhibiting neighbour.
"I will never forget, when Cara was on her knees, overwhelmed by this special space. Boyles Hardware is not a beautiful clean room, this space is brutal. So Cara spreaded out all her colorfull prints. At the end of the festival, we picked our paintings from Julianne, I started talking to Cara. It turned out that she is half Irish and half German. So I had to buy one of her prints. The rest is K-Fest history, Cara and her beautifull Becks were our "artist in residence" the year later and the two are our dearest friends." Markus Ehrhard
