Bryony Dunne is an Irish visual artist and filmmaker whose practice engages with the overlap between documentary film, cinema, photography, and the natural world. She develops research-driven projects that attempt to challenge ingrained anthropocentric and speciesist attitudes by developing imaginative and informative narratives that examines humanity’s problematic yet essential relationship to the natural world, oftentimes using fact-based fictions and hypothetical futures to build these interconnected narratives.
Non-human others and their modes of circulation have featured prominently in her work. Often retracing how animal and plant wealth were transferred across continents via the Suez Canal to zoological and botanical gardens in the West. Building on this work, she went on to explore why so-called “invasive” fish species unexpectedly migrated from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean by way of the same canal, before turning her focus on land and sea pathways to those of the sky — or, more specifically, to the parallel routes of migratory birds and people on the move. Across these projects and others, she has worked creatively with scientists—from archaeobotanists, to conservationists, to ornithologists — discovering how the data collected by satellite systems that track animals can serve as possible point of artistic intervention, whereby counternarratives that challenge our notions of migration may be formed. Her work has been exhibited at venues such as Mosaic Rooms (London), Gypsum and Townhouse galleries (Cairo), the Irish Film Institute (Dublin), DEPO (Istanbul), Thessaloniki Documentary Film Festival (Greece) and Rencontres Internationales Paris/Berlin. At present, she is a resident at the Jan van Eyck Academie in Maastricht.
RESIDENCY
2021/22 Jan Van Eyck Academie, Maastricht
2021 School of Infinite Rehearsals, facilitator James Bridle, Onassis Air, Athens
2017 A-Dash, Athens
2016 Hangar Artistic Research Centre, Lisbon
2015 Townhouse Gallery, Cairo
AWARDS AND NOMINATIONS
2020 Film Project Award, Arts Council Ireland
2019 Visual Arts Bursary Award, Arts Council Ireland
2019 National Geographic Story Telling Award
2019 Culture Ireland Grant
2018 Arab Fund for Arts and Culture – Visual Arts Award
2018 Screen Ireland Real Shorts Award
2018 Irish Nomination Euroconnection
2018 Nominee FOAM Paul Huf Award
2017 Travel and Training Award, Arts Council Ireland
2017 Best Director, Zawya Short Film Festival, Cairo, Egypt
2016 Best Documentary Short, Iranian Green Film Festival, Iran
2016 Mophradat Artist Award
2016 Travel and Training Award, Arts Council Ireland
2015 1st Prize, Ethnofilm International Film Festival, Rovinj, Croatia
2014 2nd Prize, Energy of the Truth, Saratov International Film Festival, Russia
2013 World View Media Fund Award
SCREENING AND ARTISTS TALKS
2022 Galway Film Festival, Ireland
2022 Melbourne Documentary Film Festival, Australia
2022 Online screening at Seoda global online festival, Culture Ireland
2021 Online Screening as part of the exhibition To be consumed in totality, AEMI, Dublin, Ireland
2020 Online Screening AEMI, Dublin, Ireland
2020 Aesthetica Short Film Festival, York, UK
2020 Irish Film Institute Documentary Festival, Dublin
2020 Perverting the Power Vertical at the Grant Museum of Zoology, London (POSTPONED)
2020 EMST, Museum of Contemporary Art Athens, Greece (POSTPONED)
2020 Thessaloniki Documentary Film Festival, Greece
2020 Dublin International Film Festival, Ireland
2020 Anthropocene Parallax Campus, Culturgest, Lisbon
2019 Munich Film Academy, Germany
2019 Cork International Film Festival. Ireland
2019 Wild Orchards Will Overgrow Us, Presentation at Hospitalfield, Scotland
2019 A School of Images, a workshop presentation with James Bridle, Onassis Foundation
2019 Athens School of Fine Arts, Greece
2018 Biennale of Western Balkans, Ioannina, Northern Greece
2018 Olhares do Mediterrâneo, Lisbon
2018 Rencontres Internationales Paris/Berlin
2018 Now and After, International Video Art Festival, Saint Petersburg, Russia
2018 Kuala Lumpur Experimental Film and Video Festival, Malaysia
2018 Now & After International Video Art Festival
2017 Shnit International Short Film Festival
2017 Radio Telefis Eireann, RTE
2017 The Mosaic Rooms, London, UK
2017 Fastnet International Film Festival, Ireland
2017 American University in Cairo, Egypt
2017 Clermont – Ferrand International Short Film Festival, France
2017 A-DASH, Athens, Greece
2017 Zawya Short Film Festival, Cairo, Egypt
2017 Visons du Reel, media library screening, Nyon, Switzerland
2017 Galway International Film Festival, Ireland
2016 Hangar, Centre for Artistic Investigation, Lisbon, Portugal
2016 Irish Film Institute, Dublin
2016 Moldox Documentary Film Festival, Moldova
2016 Riga World Film Festival, Kino Bize, Latvia
2016 Iranian Green Film Festival, Tehran, Iran
2015 Chester Beatty Library, Dublin, Ireland
2015 Contemporary Image Collective, Cairo, Egypt
2015 Olhares do Mediterrâneo, Lisbon
2015 Trento Film Festival, Italy
2015 Ethnofilm Festival, Croatia
2015 Socially Relevant Film Festival, New York
2015 Dingle International Film Festival, Ireland
2015 Days of Ethnographic Film, Slovenia
2015 Goldsmiths University, Dep Visual Anthropology, London, UK
2015 P 21 Gallery, London, UK
2015 Antropofest, Prague, Czech Republic
2015 The Frontline Club, London, UK
2014 Bilbao Mountain Film Festival, Spain
2014 Festival International du film de Montagne, France
2014 Sinai Conference, Netherlands Institute in Cairo, Egypt
2014 Nour Festival of the Arts, Leighton House Museum, London, UK
2014 Banff Mountain International Film Festival, Canada
2014 Guth Gafa International Film Festival, Ireland
2014 Saratov International Film Festival, Russia
2014 The Mosaic Rooms, London, UK
2014 Ismailia International Film Festival, Ismailia, Egypt
2014 Medimed Euro-Mediterranean Documentary Market, Barcelona, Spain
2013 Townhouse Gallery, Cairo, Egypt
FILMOGRAPHY
2022 Surrender Your Horns / 60 min
2020 Killing the Messengers / 11 min
2019 Above the Law / 13 min
2017 Things Stay For a While / 10 min
2016 Bring them Back Alive / 7 min
2016 Gasper / 20 min
2014 The Orchard Keepers / 28 min
SOLO / DUO EXHIBITION
2019 My Dear Friends, DEPO, Istanbul
2017 Amriya, Medrar Gallery for Contemporary Art, Cairo, Egypt
2016 They Usually Lie Around a Grotto, Townhouse Gallery, Cairo, Egypt
GROUP
2022 The Sky Only Welcomes Those with Wings, New Irish Works Photo Ireland Festival
2021 Urgencies, CCA Derry – Londonderry, Centre for Contemporary Art
2021 Gardening, Zoumboulakis Gallery, Athens
2020 Etat d’Urgence d’Instatnts Poetiques, Botanical Garden, Rabat, Morocco and Le Cube
2020 Photo London Digital, online edition
2020 The Loss and the Rest, Art Athina, Zoumboulakis Gallery, Athens
2019 Through Other Eyes, NeMe, Cyprus
2018 6th Athens Biennale –ANTI (Peng Collective), Athens, Greece.
2018 The Truth About Fiction, Gypsum Gallery, Cairo, Egypt
2017 Athens Photography Festival, Benaki Museum, Greece
2017 Bahar, Sharjah Art Biennial 13 Tamawuj off-site exhibition, Istanbul, Turkey
2015 Trento Photography Festival, Italy
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
2022 The School of Infinite Rehersals Movement 1-IV, Onassis Foundation
2016 Seeds from the Zoo
2015 The Orchard Keepers, forward by Maria Golia
TEACHING
2013 – 2016 Tutor of Photography, German University in Cairo, Egypt
EDUCATION
2010 MA, UNESCO World Heritage Studies, University College Dublin, Ireland
2003 HND, Interior and Set Design, Bray Art and Design College, Ireland.