“betwixt and between”, September 2025,
The banner has appliqued text in the Irish Language that reads: nior chuala einne gaire no focal aisti
ar feadh seacht mbliana. This is a reference to the Bo Almquist essay “Of Mermaids and Marriages. Seamus Heaney's 'Maighdean Mara' and Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill's 'an Mhaighdean Mhara' in the Light of Folk Tradition”,
Beoloideas, National Folklore Archive, 1990.
Text Excerpt from the article: pg 28-29
In certain of them we meet the trait that the mermaid seldom talked (or laughed) after the capture. This
motif is frequently found in versions amalgamated with another tale, which we may entitle The Three
Laughs of the Mermaid, examples of which are listed in The Types of the Irish Folktale under Type
670.45 Hybrids between this tale and The Man Who Married the Mermaid legend occur mainly in
Cork, Kerry and Limerick (though occasional versions have been found further north). other versions,
however, there is no trace of the motif that the mermaid laughed three times for three specific reasons.
Instead we meet with only a simple stark statement such as 'she never spoke', 'she never or hardly ever
spoke', 'she spoke first when she got back her cap' or nfor chuala einne gaire no focal aisti ar feadh
seacht mbliana ('nobody heard her laugh or speak a single word for seven years') .
Using Irish, a vulnerable language due to its own history of colonial suppression; the stitched powers
of silence and voice names themes of failure and refusal, as Sara Admed reminds us failure exposes
the violence embedded in normative ideals. Rather than striving to conform we are invited to inhabit
failure critically as a way of resisting and reorienting the structures that define whose lives are valued
and why.
“she went back to the water of course, of course; but they say around here, you know, that some nights she comes.....up to the house and combs the youngsters hair”
Context:The title of this piece is a direct quote from folklorist Seán Ó hEochaidh in the essay by Bo Almquist “Of Mermaids and Marriages. Seamus Heaney's 'Maighdean Mara' and Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill's 'an Mhaighdean Mhara' in the Light of Folk Tradition”, Beoloideas, National Folklore Archive, 1990. This essay looks at variations in the perception of mermaids in the folkloric cannon, also marriage, abandonement, abuse and subsequently the mermaids protest of silence.
Almquist, B, 1990, "Of Mermaids and Marriages"
My interest in making this work was focused on the notion of this hyphenated women trapped in an
ambiguous situation. She returns to the sea, but also sometimes re-emerges to land to comb her
childrens hair. It signs a double bind situation, where no action will result in agency or peace of mind.
The work address Lauren Berlant’s theory of Cruel Optimism and the labour of the good self
regulating citizen.