Sample-Studios in partnership with Gurranabraher Credit Union has been awarded the 2022 Business to Arts Award for Best Small Sponsorship for their Community Photography Project, PhotoGo. Business to Arts mission is to build creative partnerships between arts and business; so that the creativity and acumen of both communities develop quality cultural experiences and world-class collaborations in Ireland.
In 2019, a partnership was established between Gurranabraher Credit Union and Sample‑Studios to celebrate their shared community through creativity and the accessible medium of photography. It was launched on Culture Night 2020 and invited Corkonians to take photographs which celebrated Cork City’s Northside communities and the theme of ‘legacy’, to mark the important centenary year of the Burning of Cork in 1920.
The partnership presented a public competition that received over 100 photo entries, including entries by local Transition Year students from St. Vincent’s Secondary School and Gaelcholáiste Mhuire A.G, who participated in a series of free school’s photography workshops with artist and Sample-Studios member Kate McElroy. The shortlisted entries were then displayed for a month in the windows of the Lord Mayor’s Pavilion, Fitzgeralds Park alongside an online exhibition. Over 4,000 public votes were received and 5,000 commemorative calendars were sold.
Emer Yip, acting Artistic Director of Sample-Studios speaking about this Award said “We are thrilled to have won the Business to Arts Best Small Sponsorship Award in recognition of our PhotoGo programme. Partnering with GCU offered Sample-Studios a meaningful connection with our surrounding community in Cork City’s Northside. Now, GCU customers and the surrounding communities it serves in Gurranabraher, Knocknaheeny and Holyhill are aware of our community of more than 90 artists. Together, we celebrated our shared community through creativity.”