Sample-Studios have launched a new 5-year Strategic Plan 2023-2027 which sets out an ambitious roadmap for the development of one of Ireland’s largest artist studios.
Sample-Studios was established in 2011 as an artist-led voluntary organisation, based in the former tax office on Sullivan’s Quay, to provide affordable studio spaces to artists in Cork City Centre. 12 years later and following a move to Churchfield in the City’s Northside in 2016, Sample-Studios is thriving as a professional studios with over 120 artist members. Sample currently produces a year-round programme of public exhibitions in The Lord Mayor’s Pavilion, as well as community outreach activities which welcome over 22,000 participants and visitors annually. For every €1 invested in the organisation by Cork City Council, Sample-Studios members return €23.53 to the Cork economy.
Central to the Strategic vision for the next 5 years is supporting artists to maintain their practice and thrive within Cork, further contributing to the cultural vibrancy of the City. As Artistic Director Aoibhie McCarthy commented: “We launch, support, and sustain creative careers and practices in Cork by providing affordable studios, quality exhibition platforms, supported residencies, professional development workshops and employment opportunities as part of our education and outreach programmes.”
Speaking at the launch of the Strategic Plan, current Chair of the Board, Carl Dixon stated: “We ensure that artists can thrive in Cork, with facilities, enabling supports, and a peer network. Our residencies, which provide pathways to professional practice for emerging and marginalised artists, are part of our strategy to actively prevent a hemorrhaging of talent from this region. Sample-Studios are keen to future-proof more than a decade of supports for artists, by identifying a more permanent home in the City in which to achieve our ambitions.”
Also speaking at the launch, the new Chair of the Board, UCC’s Dr James O’Sullivan, remarked: “Over the next five years, Sample-Studios will focus on delivering our strategic ambitions, delivering our vision to be a catalyst in the artistic and cultural vibrancy of Cork and the creative community beyond, and that we are appropriately resourced and supported to continue to do so, to launch, support and sustain creative careers and practices in Cork.”
Read the Strategic Plan here.