Hopefully, all you need to know about submitting entries to ÉIRÍ
The closing date for adult entries to the competition is set for 31st October 2022
The closing date for schools’ entries has been extended to 21st, December 2022.
Submissions can take the form of text or photographs of art, no more than 5MB in size, please, sent by email, to kenna.ralph@gmail.com and editor@irishpost.co.uk. These should be accompanied by a description of how the art relates to Irish mythology or folklore.
Other Questions
Q: Can I enter again this year if I submitted to the Sinann project or if I was one of the winners of that competition?
A: Yes. The aim is to raise awareness and interest in female figures in Irish mythology and folklore and we don’t wish to exclude anyone from contributing. Any submission to ÉIRÍ will be considered independent of any contribution to the Sinann project.
Q: Is it possible to submit material that has been previously published?
A: It is likely that previously published work, while original at the time of publication, would be considered less original in the context of the project. The aim of the project is to (a) enhance interest in and awareness of women in Irish mythology and (b) to demonstrate that Ireland has the talent to depict them. Existing work achieves the latter but less so the former. Also, artists/poets who only had a few months to create their art may be disadvantaged by pre-existing work that had no time-limit on its creation. Therefore, existing work is welcomed, and we would seek to promote your work, but it may not score as highly in the “originality” criterion.
Q: Is it so that only art and not writing might result in payment?
A: There is no “payment” as such. The artistic part is eligible for the prize. And the art can be in any medium – poetry, paintings, writing, short stories, music, anything (so long as it’s original).
The written participatory research project does not come with a financial reward. Here you get the chance to say what women in Irish mythology mean to you. To get an idea of what artistic entries we had in a previous (smaller) project, you can go to one of these websites:
The Art For Sinann Gallery Page.
Q: Is there a size linit for photographic submissions?
A: Yes. Please keep file size to less than 5MB. Larger file sizes may xause delivery issues.
Q: Is there is any kind of fee available for submissions if they get published or included?
A: There is no fee for you to enter the competition or project. We pay no fee to submitters either. Your motive to enter should not be monetary – you should be inspired to submit for your own joy and your own sense of inclusion. There is no monetary reward if your work is published or included. But if you enter and don’t win, you can certainly opt out and ask that your work not be made public.
Q: Is your intention to publish in an open-source academic journal?
A: We don’t yet how many submissions we will receive. For participatory research, if we receive only a few submissions, we might not have enough impact for a journal paper (we would have to submit to a journal and go through the normal procedure of peer review etc.). And if we had hundreds of submissions, we would not have enough room to publish everything in a journal. So, we have to “play by ear” and see what comes in. we could collate entries and paraphrase or summarise and try to publish in a journal. Then we may be able to thank people in the “Acknowledgements” section and mention them by name if they want. Or we might be able to publish everything online in – we simply don’t know yet.
Q: For participants who research, write, and share, will you also include a link to their website?
A: Yes, if we can, we could put in a link to people’s websites if appropriate. There will certainly be a dedicated reference page on Story Archaeology.
Q: Is there a limit on the number of submissions can send in?
A: No – but please keep in mind that we have a finite panel of assessors. We do not have infinite resources and rely on the goodwill of our panel members. So please be sensible and embrace the spirit of the project.
If you have further queries please contact Story Archaeology and I will ensure you receive an answer a.s.a.p.
I’m afraid my file size was larger than 5mb as I was taking a high resolution photograph of my painting, and I didn’t know how to decrease the size. It still sent and could be viewed and downloaded, but I don’t know if that means I’m disqualified?