ARCHIVE: Crystal Cloud

June 4, 2026
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Award winning choreographer Fiona Quilligan brought her show Crystal Cloud to Esker Arts on Friday 14th November.

Her show brings a handful of glorious films that merge with live performance by a superb cast featuring dancers, Olwen Grindley, Yves Lorrhan, and Eoin Macdonncha.

Quilligan describes the performance as a journey along the river in a voyage of self-expression, where we feel the heat of the sun on a beautiful May day, tremble with excitement under the dappled leaves and soak up nature’s restorative rays. A heron is standing sentinel, mid-river with fluttering feathers. Stoic. Its beady eye looks deep into the shadowy waters seeing images of love, loss and war. We fall into these reflections and dance with passion, fragility and joy. Strong as crystal suspended in time, we live with gratitude for our own freedom and with hope for a more peaceful world. Sometimes dark, Crystal Cloud reveals the fractured light that spills into our lives as we dance a rainbow of colour.

Fiona Quilligan, award-winning choreographer, born in Dublin, trained at the London School of Contemporary Dance and from 1982-86 performed with Dublin City Ballet. In 1986, she founded Rubato Ballet, creating original works for the company which received critical acclaim, the Nijinsky medal from Warsaw and AIB Better Ireland Award in Arts and Culture. Fiona received an MA in performance from the University of Limerick. She is a member of Aosdana and a founding member of Dance Ireland.

Fiona has created many works for Project Arts including Signals, Live Sax, Burnt Brown Flem, Monkey Rib, A Close Shave, Pas de Chat, and CASTS AND CONVERSATIONS. Her most recent work ANCESTOR premiered in the Irish Film Institute in 2022 and on RTE Player and Digital Arts. It has recently been added to the prestigious catalogue of Filmmakers Coop NYC. 

Images by Malfi Productions

Two women dancing on stage with forest projection behind them
A double exposure of figures dancing on a stage.
A man dancing on the left of the image, double-exposed with the image of a woman sitting on a chair.
Two men, one mid-air, the other walking. A bed frame and mattress lies in front of them.
Two men standing on stage. One is carrying a woman away in both his arms. A bench is sitting in the rear. Background wall is coloured violet.
Three women on stage each posing with their own piece of furniture. Two are standing with chairs, the other is sitting on a bench.
A man is hoisting a woman up in the air with both arms while walking past a bench. The woman has her hand raised in the air.
Three figures crouched low on the floor with limbs joined together to form a pose. Background is a deep vibrant red.
black silhouette of a man carrying a bed frame. Backlit by a deep, blood red wall of waves.
Two women reaching for each other. The back of their hands are touching. A forest and river in the background.
A woman bows low as the other raises high. They are distant from each other. A woman is in between above them in a forest in the background.
a man wearing only trousers poses in the centre of the image. the back wall displays a woman posing in the forest.