One of the contributors to this years Muscailt, a student based art exhibition is 3rd year Arts student Dave Rock who is presenting a photographic exhibition entitled Pushing The Light 2. Rock’s photographs ask us to slow down and to look deeper into what is in front of us. He is developing themes from last years exhibition with a kaleidoscope of vivid images that are larger and more colorful than ever. "The ideas behind how I’m taking pictures at the moment is that I’m trying to illustrate the page turning frame of mind we have when we read magazines and its exactly parallel to how we channel hop on T.V. and what this leads to if we’re not careful is a mish mash of images. One second you could be watching genocide then two seconds later you could be watching The Simpsons, and so you can become apathetic very easily. I think what happens when we read magazines is I could be reading about women in Afghanistan being afraid to go to work and I turn the page and there’s an advertisement for pizza and suddenly I’m hungry and I’m not thinking about Afghanistan anymore. It’s a juxtaposition of the tragic and the ridiculous. What I aim to do is to show both sides of the same page using lights. I used a big bunch of magazines and said "Right, I’m going to get all my pictures from these" and I got 20 A3 pictures of various things."

What does Dave Rock think of Muscailt? "Muscailt is great. It gives students a chance to get themselves out there, whatever they want to perform or display. A lot of people wouldn’t be able to do these things if Muscailt wasn’t on. It provides funding and a platform."Writers’ Soc are also organizing a number of events starting with a Poetry Slam competition where cash prizes are up for grabs. "We are offering €150 for the best seasoned performer and €150 for the best newcomer" Anyone who can write and read poems can come along to try and wow the crowd, and the poetry will be judged on presentation as well as content. "We’re also bringing a bunch of kids from Secondary schools around Galway as part of a Slam for Secondary Schools program and they will also be performing. The special guest is Brendan Murphy, the Ireland Slam Champion, who’ll be doing a twenty minute set."

Another event not to be missed is the Literary Evening which will have an emphasis on performance and fun. "People can get up and read stories, poems, jokes, songs, anything at all. We’ll have a violinist and a pianist there too! We will be encouraging people from the audience to get up and take control, we’re offering free drinks to everyone who performs."
Is there a vibrant literary scene in NUIG? "There’s a lot going on in NUIG and Galway as regards writing and performance- for poetry slamming we’re considered to be the best place in Ireland. It’s becoming a really big thing. It’s a very important medium that lets people get up and express themselves. Writing can be a very lonely thing and to get up and performing can be important, it’s definitely helped me as a writer."

In keeping with performance on Monday 4th February, the Literary and Debating Society and the Law Society are joining together to stage a re-creation of the first Trial of Oscar Wilde. This production is closely based on the transcripts of the trial, and features a fascinating show down between one of the greatest legal minds, and one of the greatest literary minds of the 1890’s. In its day, the trial was an unmissable event and today the recreation is as well. Elsewhere in drama there are a series of original one act plays taking place every lunchtime in the Bank of Ireland Theatre, with an omnibus edition of all plays on Friday 8th at 5pm. Nine playwrights will be competing for The Jerome Hynes Memorial Trophy.

On a lighter note the Annual GUMS Musical is back with the fresh and colourful "Back to the Eighties". Derek Calahan told me a bit about the show: "It’s a comedy love story and the audience can expect plenty of laughs. It’s set in a high school and narrated by one of the characters some years later. Corey is looking back on his High School days in the Eighties, so you can imagine something like Saved by the Bell. We had so many laughs just rehearsing it, I’m sure when we get it onto the stage the audience will enjoy it too."
"It was released in Broadway a few years ago. This is its west of Ireland premiere. We think that a show like this would really suit a university campus; we’ve had a lot of great feedback so far from students."The eighties has become something of a theme for this year’s Muscailt, other societies have been inspired by the eighties

For music lovers there’s plenty to keep students happy this year. Amongst other events the final of the Witless Battle of the Bands takes place on Tuesday night at 8pm in the college bar. I asked Vincent, one of the judges and member of Music Soc, what the music scene in NUIG was like: "It’s diverse, some good, some great. There are a high percentage of metal bands. Up to this the heats have been really exciting. The choices have been very hard to make and it’s going to be a great final, a highlight of Muscailt for a lot of people."

If you’re looking for something a little more relaxing there is a classical recital taking place in the Aula Maxima on Tuesday at 7:30pm. The Orchestra Society, under the baton of ace conductor Hugh Kelly, will perform a range of stirring pieces, including Schubert’s unfinished symphony and Mozart’s violin concerto in D major.

To wrap up this week long celebration of the Arts in NUIG the college bar goes wild with an old style country barn dance complete with fancy dress and bales of hay. For one night only Galway favorites No Banjo light up the stage with their catchy music and will get the crowd dancing the night away.