Bren Byrne has been integral to OFFSET since its inception in 2009, when as part of a team along with Richard Seabrooke and Peter O’Dwyer, he helped set up the festival. He now serves as creative director of the OFFSET along with Lisa Haran (pictured above). We spoke to Bren to get a feel for some of his highlights from the festival from the past and what to expect in the 2015 edition.
Are there any speakers that you are particularly excited to be bringing over? And do you have any particular highlights from previous years that you recommend checking out in the archive?
I’m very excited about Tomi Ungerer. He’s such a fascinating man, so passionate and obviously he’s incredibly talented. We are expecting a very special presentation from Swedish agency SNASK – at least they have assured us it’s going to be special! Hopefully we will be welcoming the guys from Cartoon Saloon on stage with their Oscar too. With regard to our archive, choosing from our 100 hours of content, all of which is available for free, is difficult but I still watch both Kyle Cooper and George Lois a lot. They’re both so inspirational, I’m getting goose bumps even writing about it.
Given the Irish Design 2015 campaign is doing an extra push on Irish design and creative industries, where do you see Ireland’s position within Europe and worldwide in these industries? And have you noticed a change since you began in OFFSET in 2009?
I think ID2015 is an interesting and valuable initiative. In some ways, not having a cohesive body that represents design in its many forms, or at least tries to present an overarching point of contact for design, has been to the detriment of our industries and that has resulted in lots of non-connected groups operating, and competing in some cases, for the same space. It’s not perfect by any means. There are lots of things to learn from what ID2015 are doing and just as much in what they are not doing. But it’s a young initiative and I believe its intentions are right. And at the very least it has persuaded government of the value of design – for now.
In terms of our place in global culture, we have great representatives in most fields. There are Irish people who are absolutely killing it creatively in every major city in the world and, importantly, here at home. What I have noticed since we started in 2009 is that there seems to be much more co-operation between practitioners. It’s become less isolated and silo-based. This generosity may be a generational thing, but it’s very exciting to see ambitious projects happening on both grand and small scales and with a multi-disciplinary nature, which is how we have always curated OFFSET.
What, personally, is your favourite part of the OFFSET weekend?
The moment the doors open. That is a great feeling when after six months of planning the event is finally on. Getting to lunchtime on the first day, after that its plain sailing and we can all start enjoying the talks and the social aspects of the event. Having said that, the pints in The Ferryman with the speakers and our audience at the end of each day is probably the most fun though.
You mentioned previously about possibly doing other events beyond Ireland. Are there any concrete plans in place yet?
We are working on plans to expand our visibility outside of the annual three days in Dublin. This will hopefully see us debuting overseas but will also feature more national appearances outside of our usual talking style events. We feel OFFSET has a lot more to offer the creative community and we’re excited with the plans that are bubbling away. We hope to announce the first wave of this at OFFSET Dublin.
Don’t forget you can win tickets to each of the #Absolut DIY workshops curated by OFFSET in collaboration with Absolut Ireland right here. They’re all sold out so this is your chance!
You can also win one of two pairs of tickets to OFFSET festival itself over here.
Words: Ian Lamont
