Sink or swim? An artist in the Gus Healy Pool
A suburban pool which has hosted many life forms in its half century existence is the setting for Natasha Bourke’s singular performance as part of Cork Midsummer Festival
The Gus Healy Swimming Pool in Ballinlough is the venue for what might well be the most unique performance in the Cork Midsummer Festival this year, as Natasha Bourke’s Kilter, Matter & Ghosts will bring audience members through the doors of the old building on Nursery Drive, for a genre defying solo performance melding movement, film and sound.
This highly ambitious project, which examines themes of identity, transience and vulnerability has been a long time in the making and Bourke has had to show some stellar levels of persistence to see it finally come to life.
Over ten years ago, she was injured in an aerial performance and afterward spent a lot of time rehabilitating in swimming pools. This traumatic experience however, set Bourke down a path she was determined to follow to the very end.
“It goes back to around 2012, that’s when the dreaming started. I had to stop my career in aerial dance and had also stepped away from fine art, so I was a wounded creature floating on my back in the pool.”
“For a long while, it was just a silly wisp of an idea that I first voiced to someone in 2018.”
“Then a few years ago I approached the Midsummer festival and kept the conversation going over a period of time. I got an Agility Award from the Arts Council to talk to production people and last year I decided I had to put in a bid for the Project Award, because it felt like now or never.”
“So yeah, a lot of brute force determination, but a fair few tears on the way.”
While Bourke was attempting to get this work funded, she also began a deeper inquiry into swimming pools as social spaces.
“I started thinking about inviting a viewer into a private world of vulnerability, which was rooted in my own archive, because it’s the only story I know how to tell. And the challenge then is to try to make my own story universal.”
“I have a fascination with space and matter and things disappearing and our own erasure.”
“And I became interested in the transience of stories in pools. You hear stories in that space that are unique.”
But how has working in the Gus Healy Swimming Pool been as a performer? It is a building after all, which many locals have very mixed feelings about, especially given its current condition.
The public pool, named after a former Lord Mayor of Cork is one of the very few extant pools owned by the City Council. It’s managed by a private firm and local politicians have long been calling for funding for the facility to be upgraded.
“I certainly got a lot of exercise coming in and out of the different orifices of the building and we use walkie talkies to communicate because it’s hard to hear as there’s a lot of acoustic boom.”
“The pool is a high functioning facility to so many people in Cork, but it has a duality. The old saunas and steam rooms are no longer in use. And having this show here is adding a new layer to its history.”
“It’s a projection on my part, but it could be shut down because of our obsession with profit and progress.”
This isn’t Bourke’s first foray into examining unusual spaces in the city. Her film Concrete Keys, which enjoyed a sold out run at the Cork Film Festival in 2022, was largely shot in the old Fás Building on Sullivans Quay. So perhaps there are some similarities with this work.
“I did think, ‘Could I make Concrete Keys in another way, in a pool, but it’s not here we go again?’They are not consciously linked, but I have been seeing some links between the two projects.”
All of the tickets for the four nights for Kilter, Matter and Ghosts have been snapped up, but T+D were fortunate enough to have a sneak peak at the dress rehearsal and audiences are in for an intriguing experience as it is a fascinating piece, which at times is very moving.
“This is the most linear thing I’ve ever made, but it may not seem that way to a lot of people.
“I’d like people to embrace it, but I don’t want to sound too didactic and I have no real control over how it will land.”
“Having gone through the fine art system, which is so much about concept, I’d rather people feel than try to understand it.”
And after all the time spent dreaming and planning, how does Bourke feel about finally getting this project made?
“I don’t come from a conventional background and meet industry standards but staying true to my warbled process was important. It didn’t start with a script, the images came first.”
“But it’s so amazing looking around the pool, I can’t believe I’ve made this happen.”
For more information about Kilter, Matter & Ghosts, see here
To see more of Natasha Bourke’s work, see here
This looks like very important work, especially considering the importance of third spaces and how they play such a vital role for communities.