Turlough McConnell Communications – | Ireland in America™

Live Events

Posted on September 11, 2012 by elina

Plays by Tom Murphy

DruidMurphy Tour

Associate Co-Producer for Quinnipiac University

Crossing oceans and spanning decades, DruidMurphy covers the period from The Great Hunger of the 19th century to the ‘new’ Ireland of the 70s through three of the greatest plays of Tom Murphy: Conversations on a Homecoming, A Whistle in the Dark and Famine. DruidMurphy is a major celebration of one of Ireland’s most respected living dramatists and is presented in a co-production with Quinnipiac University, NUI Galway, Lincoln Center Festival and Galway Arts Festival.

Druid Theatre Company

Multi-award winning and internationally known, Druid was co-founded in Galway in 1975, the first professional theatre company in Ireland to be based outside Dublin by Garry Hynes, the first woman to be honored with a Tony Award for direction. The company tours Ireland and key global centers, reinvigorating perceptions of classic Irish plays and engaging with new dramatic works of a challenging, innovative and daring kind.

Inaugural US Ireland Forum

Executive Director

The Inaugural U.S.-Ireland Forum was held in New York on November 7 and 8, 2007. Irish America Magazine, together with the American Ireland Fund, University College Dublin, and the Irish Government co-hosted the event at the Affinia Manhattan Hotel.

Over the two days some of the finest Irish and Irish-American minds came together to discuss the changing relationship between the two countries. Themes explored included: Social Capital and Philanthropy, Culture and Education, The Future of the Celtic Tiger, Philanthropy in Ireland, and Ireland—U.S.: The Next Generation.

Inaugural Tour of the Jeanie Johnston

International Tour Producer

The Jeanie Johnston, a replica of a 408-ton wooden sailing vessel in which over 2,500 Irish people crossed the Atlantic between 1848 and 1855, without the loss of a single life, left Fenit Harbor, Tralee, Ireland in February 2003. After a grueling 60-day transatlantic passage, she called in at port cities along the Eastern Seaboard, including Palm Beach, Savannah, and New York City, before returning to Ireland. She is permanently moored in Dublin, where she is open for public tours.

Mayor’s Cup Race 2004

South Street Seaport Museum Producer

As New York City’s only maritime museum, South Street Seaport Museum takes a prominent place in the city’s celebrations of its sailing and working-waterfront past and present.

Click here to read an article by Turlough McConnell in Seaport Magazine

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Irish Famine Sculpture Exhibition Opens at Consulate

Posted on September 5, 2012 by elina

Quinnipiac University to Open Major Exhibit of Irish Famine Sculpture, Paintings and Literature at the Consulate General of Ireland in New York City

May 20, 2010

HAMDEN, Conn., May 20 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — Quinnipiac University will open a major exhibition of sculpture, paintings and writings about the Irish Famine on Friday, May 21, at the Consulate General of Ireland in New York City. This marks the first time the exhibit has ever traveled from its permanent home in the Lender Special Collection Room at Quinnipiac.

“Ireland’s Great Hunger, An Gorta Mor, The Quinnipiac University Collection,” focuses on the famine years 1845-1850, when a blight destroyed virtually all of Ireland’s potato crops for consecutive years.

The crop destruction, coupled with British governmental indifference to the plight of the Irish, who at the time were part of the United Kingdom, resulted in the deaths of 1.5 million Irish men, women and children and the emigration of more than two million to nations around the world. This tragedy occurred even though there was more than adequate food in the country to feed its starving populace.

Exports of food and live stock from Ireland actually increased during the years of the Great Hunger. The exhibition contains sculptures by noted artists John Behan, Glenna Goodacre, Rowan Gillespie and Kieran Tuohy. Several of the pieces in the collection are maquettes, or miniatures, of Famine memorials that have been erected in recent years both at Irish ports where families embarked for new lands and at ports of entry in the United States and Canada, where the Irish fled in desperation.

Paintings, lithographs, photographs and etchings by artists Padraic Reaney, Micheal Farrell and Kit de Fever are also featured.

The extensive book collection held in the permanent collection at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut, is represented in photographs and video features. The books are used for scholarly research both at the University and by other faculty scholars.

The exhibition is on display at the Consulate General of Ireland, 345 Park Ave., 17th floor, New York City, through Sept. 3. Visitors are welcome to view the exhibit weekdays, but should call the Consulate at 212-319-2555 for specific times and hours or visit the website www.thegreathunger.org. Admission is free.

Quinnipiac University is a private, coeducational, nonsectarian institution located 90 minutes north of New York City and two hours south of Boston. The university enrolls 5,700 full-time undergraduate and 2,000 graduate students in 52 undergraduate and 20 graduate programs of study in its School of Business, School of Communications, School of Education, School of Health Sciences, School of Law and College of Arts and Sciences. The 2009 issue of U.S. News and World Report’s America’s Best Colleges named Quinnipiac as the top up-and-coming school with master’s programs in the North. For more information about Quinnipiac, please visit www.quinnipiac.edu.

SOURCE Quinnipiac University

redOrbit (http://s.tt/17Doi)

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Ireland’s Great Hunger Documentary

Posted on August 6, 2012 by elina

Role: Producer

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Inaugural US Ireland Forum

Posted on August 5, 2012 by elina

Role: Producer

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Creating, Building and Delivering Landmark Culture Projects

Posted on March 13, 2012 by andrew

To mark the 160th anniversary of the opening of Saint Patrick’s Cathedral we created and produced a history timeline that is now on display in the cathedral.

Turlough McConnell is a writer and producer who specializes in subjects of historical significance, including art and culture, immigration, Famine effects, and 19th-century New York City. For over three decades, he has contributed numerous Special Features articles and spreads to Irish America Magazine and the Irish Voice newspaper. The creator of many museum exhibitions across the U.S., Turlough also serves as Special Advisor to Ireland’s Great Hunger Museum and Institute at Quinnipiac University.

This year, his historical exhibition, Champions of the Cathedral, opened at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral in New York where it is currently on display. He produced the exhibition The Irish Mission at Watson House: The Untold History of the Home for Irish Immigrant Girls in Lower Manhattan, 1883-1954. That exhibition just opened at the Archives of the Archdiocese of New York, Yonkers. This month, in conjunction with the National Famine Museum at Strokestown Ireland he will launch the US and Canadian tour of The Great Famine Voices Roadshow at the Embassy of Ireland in Washington, DC.

Earlier this year his play Bishop Maginn: Good Shepherd in a Time of Hunger was read at the Consulate of Ireland New York and also at Culturlann in Derry, Northern Ireland.

In 2018, a reading of his dramatic work, Dear Mr. Beckett, written in collaboration with publisher Glenn Young, was featured at the Consulate of Ireland New York as part of the Origin Theatre’s 1st Irish NYC Festival. His production, Ulster at Play, an overview of theater in Ulster during the last century, was presented at the American Irish Historical Society.

In 2017, a staged reading of Turlough’s play, The Wars of Dagger John, was performed at the Sheen Center Theater, as was his stage show, How The Nuns of New York Tamed the Gangs of New York.

Recently Turlough was commissioned by Origin Theater to write The Land of Promise: A Celebration of the Scots-Irish. The multi-media theatrical presentation opened at the Sheen Center, Manhattan in partnership with Carnegie Hall’s festival, Migrations The Making of America – A City Wide Festival.

Turlough received the 2017 Ambassador of Ireland Award, which recognizes an individual who has made an exceptional difference to furthering the relationship between the people of Ireland and the United States. Given each year by a representative of the Government of Ireland, Turlough was honored at the Saint Patrick’s Parade of Holyoke, Massachusetts.

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