Why do we step outside of our comfort zone? Why what we have and what we know is never enough? Every new discovery brings new frustrations. With every answered question we are getting smaller
and more insignificantin the comparison to the universe we live in and to the dreams we dream. And yet. We never stop asking.

Scientist and performer Dr Niamh Shaw many years ago discovered in herself a need of going to Space and seeing the Earth from a distance.
In 2014 she decided to turn something that was once a childhood fantasy and an adult brag into an actual campaign.

For many months she’s been interviewing astronauts, scientists, space industries, and potential future colonists of Mars. She undertook a rigorous training that prepares astronauts for their space missions, documenting every step.
 

Now in a multimedia performance To SPACE she explores the costs of her ambition and exposes
the politics behind space exploration.

"To Space has much to recommend it, not least the stargazer’s perspective on the world, a gentle humour, and more illuminating facts, figures and insights than you could shake a Hubble Space Telescope at".
- Emma Somers, The Irish Times.

To SPACE was created in association with CIT Blackrock Castle Observatory, Cork, Science
Foundation Ireland, and ESERO Ireland for Tiger Dublin Fringe 2014 and redesigned for a presentation in the Summerhall, Anatomy Lecture Theatre at Edinburgh Dublin Fringe 2015.

 

Creative team:
Creator, writer, performer: Niamh Shaw
Director: Sarah Baxter
Visual Artist: Clare Henderson
A/V: Mick Cullinan
Producer: Joanna Crawley

Original collabolators: Dan Colley and Ronan Phelan
Photos: Naoise Culhane
Poster: Sarah Fox

Crew: Liadan Ni Chearbhaill and Conor Burnell
Lighting designer: Patrick W. Anthony, Eoin Winning