Mary Wycherley

Mary Wycherley was born in West Cork, Ireland in 1977. She is based in Co. Tipperary and works both nationally and internationally. As a dance artist, choreographer, filmmaker and curator, her work expands across disciplines, connects communities and is experienced in live performance, cinematic and gallery settings.

Her dance-led work is propelled by a practice of noticing. She examines movement to uncover the nature of our exchanges across time, place and environment. Her curatorial impulse manifests in opportunties, provocations, and gatherings for communites via festivals and platforms for dance practice and research. Collaboration is central to her work and she connects across a range of artists and settings.

Mary’s work has been presented across a wide range of contexts including: Kilkenny Arts Festival, VOID Derry, Rua Red Gallery Dublin, Museum of Contemporary Arts Shanghai, Solas Nua Contemporary Irish Arts Centre Washington, Dublin Dance Festival, Limerick City Gallery of Art, VISUAL Carlow, American Dance Festival, Sans Souci Festival Colorado, Buenos Aires Dance Film Festival, National Museum of Contemporary Arts Bucharest, Cork Film Festival and Galway Film Fleadh.

In 2014 Mary founded Light Moves Festival acting as its curator and artistic director since its inception. In 2019 she initiated Studio Light Moves, a framework for investing in new creative processes between dance, technology and screen-based practices. Mary was appointed Limerick Dance Artist in Residence from 2015-2019 by the Arts Council of Ireland and in that role developed a series of live dance works; A Moment in Time (2016) Sinter (2017) and Invisible Histories (2018). She also initiated Open Futures, a series of new dance commissions and residencies for dance artists.

Her work has been commissioned by Dance Ireland (2009), Mary Nunan (2010), Joan Davis (2014), Liz Roche Company (2016), John Scott Company (2019) and Tipperary Dance Festival and The Heritage Council (2020). Recently toured works include the feature length film In the Bells Shadow, live dance for gallery work Invisible Histories, award-winning film WRoNGHEADED, the film quintet Far Flung Dances and No.5 Rupture. Mary is currently devising Weathering, supported by Project Arts Centre, Dance Limerick and Tanzrauschen Festival, funded by the Arts Council of Ireland and Limerick City and County Council.

Mary was lecturer and Course Director of the MA Contemporary Dance Performance 2016 and 2017 and BA Dance co-ordinator in 2013 and 2014 at the University of Limerick. She has taught on the MA Screendance at the Place London and continues to enjoy ongoing teaching at UL as well delivering professional workshops and mentoring sessions. She is currently comepleting a PhD part-time at the Centre for Dance Research, Coventry University with a focus on the artist-curator in dance and screendance. Mary is a former board member of Dance Research Forum and Dance Limerick, Ireland.