Agenda item

            The Committee was reminded that, at its meeting on 15th April, it had agreed that, in future, any request to hold exhibitions in the East Entrance be submitted in the first instance to the Strategic Policy and Resources Committee for consideration.

            The Director of Property and Projects reported that the following requests had been received:

(1)  Reunification of Italy – 150 year anniversary

      A request had been received from the Northern Ireland branch of the Lucchesi nel Mondo Association seeking authority to hold an exhibition celebrating the 150th anniversary of the unification of Italy.  The Association had been founded in 1968 and there were now 85 branches throughout the world.  The Northern Ireland branch had been established in Belfast on 8th May, 2005.  Its members consisted of Italians who had settled in Northern

      Ireland and people from Northern Ireland who had an interest in Italy.  The aim of the Association was to promote cultural links between Italy and other countries.  The exhibition, which contained a mixture of photographs, images and script, had been prepared by the region of Tuscany and focused on key events in Tuscany at the time of the reunification of Italy in 1861.

      The exhibition was currently touring a number of European cities and the Association members in Belfast were keen to hold it in the City as it would help to promote the cultural links between the two countries and would assist also with other Italian cultural events, for example, the La Scala film theatre was being approached about coming to the city.  The exhibition consisted of 20 pop-up panels and would be in place in the East Entrance from 21st November till 16th December, 2011.

(2)               Belfast and Cork Maritime Painting Exhibition

A request had been received on behalf of the Belfast Harbour Commissioner and the Crawford Municipal Gallery in Cork to stage a maritime themed painting exhibition in the City Hall for a four-week period in April, 2012.  The exhibition would include a representative selection of paintings from the Port of Cork and the Belfast Harbour collections from the period 1700 – 2000.  The paintings on display would be available for viewing purposes only and would not be for sale.  The collection would contain some paintings featuring the Titanic and it was felt hosting the exhibition in the City Hall in April, 2012 would link with other planned Titanic 2012 events. 

(3)               ‘Belfast Now’ film exhibition

The DoubleBand film company had submitted a request to host a film exhibition called ‘Belfast Now’ in the City Hall.  ‘Belfast Now’ was a cultural and creative project which was being developed in partnership with Channel 4 and the Belfast Festival at Queens.  The aim of the exhibition was to ‘reflect the changing face of Belfast and to promote a dynamic, inclusive and forward-looking vision of the city’.  There were two main aspects to the project:

·         to have two short films produced by local film maker Dervla Quigley and the photographer Adam Patterson.  Those films would reflect the artists’ vision of ‘Belfast Now’; and

·         to give local citizens and communities the opportunity to upload their own interpretations of ‘Belfast Now’ by the use of social media, including Facebook, Linkedin and Twitter.  Those on-line interpretations might take the form of photographs, a mobile phone video clip or a joke, etc.

      The organisers wished to screen the two short films and the Facebook pages in either the east exhibition area or the visitor information point room at the front entrance of the City Hall as part of the Belfast Festival at Queens programme in mid October.  The exhibition would involve a number of plasma screens being set up with some accompanying panels providing information

      about ‘Belfast Now’ and the aims of the project.  The proposed content would be provided to the Council beforehand.  The film exhibition would run for approximately two weeks and the organisers indicated that they might also approach the BBC about having the films and Facebook pages displayed on the large outdoor screens on the City Hall lawns during the MTV event in November.  Channel 4 had also expressed an interest in broadcasting the exhibition at a later date.

            The Committee approved the three applications for the use of the East Entrance for the aforementioned exhibitions.