DABF26 Launch: Iarlaith Ní Fheorais, 'There's a Tunnel Under Ballybrit Business Park'

Join author and curator Iarlaith Ní Fheorais in conversation with Michele Horrigan, Director and Curator of Askeaton Contemporary Arts, Limerick and Dr Patrick Bresnihan, Associate Professor in the Department of Geography at Maynooth University on the occasion of her new publication.

There’s a Tunnel Under Ballybrit Business Park critiques the continuing rise of Ireland as a key location for the global medical technology industry. As multinational corporation revenues soar, state bodies tightly regulate access to publicly-funded healthcare. Ní Fheorais investigates the land-use techniques, landscape aesthetics and architecture of MedTech as an inheritance of the colonial regime of the British Empire and dogma of the Catholic Church that create these conditions. Through her account of the barriers encountered in accessing prosthetic care, it becomes evident that infrastructure plays a crucial role in shaping the politics of healthcare, and how access to medical technologies is managed.
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There’s a Tunnel Under Ballybrit Business Park is published as part of access: practices and habits, a collaborative Creative Europe artistic research programme involving Askeaton Contemporary Arts in Limerick, If I Can’t Dance, I Don’t Want To Be Part Of Your Revolution in Amsterdam and Bulegoa z/b in Bilbao, unfolding throughout 2026.

Iarlaith Ní Fheorais is a curator and writer and currently an Independent Producer at field:arts, working with artists Lyónn Wolf and Rouzbeh Shadpey. Ní Fheorais was the curator of the 21st edition of TULCA Festival of Visual Arts (2023), and has written for publications such as frieze magazine, Burlington Contemporary, Viscose Journal, and Paper Visual Art. She’s the author of the Access Toolkit for Art Workers. She's currently co-directing a film with artist Sarah Browne on the drawings of the artist known as J.J. Beegan.

Michele Horrigan is director and curator of Askeaton Contemporary Arts, an artist-led organisation based in Limerick since 2006. An ongoing residency programme creates critical cultural encounters in the midst of the Irish countryside, while public programmes and exhibitions in Askeaton and elsewhere have found innovative public contexts and resilient relationships for new forms of artmaking to emerge. Recent Askeaton Contemporary Arts projects include Tate Britain, a citywide exhibition programme in Chicago and an international conference on contemporary curating in New York.

Dr Patrick Bresnihan is Associate Professor in the Department of Geography at Maynooth University. His work looks at the contested politics of land and infrastructure in Ireland, and how these speak to broader questions of postcolonial development, dependency and the green transition. He is co-author of From the Bog to the Cloud. Dependency and Eco-modernity in Ireland (2025).

Event location information: This event will take place in a room with theatre style seating, and potentially low lighting. The space is accessible by lift and stairs and there is a semi accessible bathroom. Please check-in at the cash desk in Dublin Art Book Fair, where you will be directed to the event room. For further accessibility information please contact Learning + Public Engagement Curator Órla Goodwin.

Dublin Art Book Fair (3–13 December 2026) is a centre for contemporary artist books offering a wide selection of artist publications and titles from creative, small and independent publishers, both Irish or international, to browse or buy. In conjunction with the Fair, DABF presents an programme of book launches, publishers talks, and workshops, offering ways to engage and gain insight into contemporary independent and arts publishing.

This event is part of the DABF Publisher's Talk Series which is supported by the Creative Europe Desk Ireland. The Creative Europe programme supports a diverse literature and publishing sector across Europe, funding writers, translators, publishers, and the distributors of European works of Literature. Dublin Art Book Fair 2026 is generously sponsored by our longstanding partner Henry J Lyons and supported by Dublin UNESCO City of Literature.