AISLING ARTS

Click image to see a quick video of our ensemble in action.

Fun fact: no movement was adjusted during video editing (nothing’s been slowed down, that’s the actors!)

Aisling Arts was founded in 2001 by Wendy Remington and Bryn Manion and, along with our core ensemble, we live and make theatre in New York City.

The aisling in Aisling Arts means dream or vision in the Irish language, and dreamlike qualities imbue all aspects of the plays produced by our company. Whether we make plays from the Irish repertory, radical reinterpretations of classic plays, or original creations, Aisling productions emerge gradually from the collective psyche of our ensemble. In our process of exploration, everyone is both author and actor, and plot, structure, and character remain in flux until a play begins to crystallize. We believe that theatre conceived in this way communes with the intellect and the subconscious of its audience, revealing our collective social and cultural pre-occupations via dreams, nightmares, and poetry.

Please take a look around our site and join us for an evening of theatre when the opportunity avails itself. You are always welcome!

BRYN MANION is a Pulitzer Prize nominated playwright/director and the co-founder of the Long Island City based theater company, Aisling Arts. Her play Convergence was published by NYTE in February 2007, and she directed the Force Trilogy (Wanderlust, Threshold, Convergence) for repertory production at New York City’s theater for emerging artists, The Chocolate Factory, in January/February 2007; the play was subsequently nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in Drama. Bryn most recently directed Obie Award-winning Peculiar Works Project’s Off Stage, The Plays of the East Village, and is working on two new plays, Dispersal and Private Conversations, and a film adaptation of the Force Trilogy. As an actress, Bryn has appeared with Shakespeare and Company, SITI Company, the KO Festival for Performance, the Edinburgh International Fringe Festival, the International Symposium for Performance Art, HERE, Aisling Arts and the New York Irish Center.

As a theatre educator, Bryn taught for five years at the Drama Studio, a conservatory for young actors in Springfield, MA. She has also taught workshops and summer programs as the Williston Northampton School, Smith College and was an instructor for the towns of Westfield and Southwick, MA. She developed and taught theatrical outreach for the Massachusetts Cultural Council throughout the state from 1999-2003. She has also created an annual creativity retreat called Work/Dream for adult artists in New York City and was awarded a fellowship by the prestigious White Oak Foundation in 2005 and 2008.

Bryn works in publishing, and lives in Long Island City, NY, with her husband, Sam David, and their two cats, Buddhasaurus Rex and Pachuka.

WENDY REMINGTON BOWIE is a co-founder of Aisling Arts and has acted and designed extensively with the company. As part of the off-off Broadway community, she has worked as an actor, designer, and writer collaborating with companies including the Obie-award winning Peculiar Works Project and TOSOS II, was a festival adjudicator for the clown, mask and burlesque category of the New York International Fringe Festival, and she was a reviewer for nytheater.com as part of their festival reviewing squad. Wendy graduated with honors from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst where she studied theater and education. Additionally, she trained in scene study at Michael Howard studios with Deborah Kampmeier and studied Shakespearean acting at the London Academy of Performing Arts.

Wendy has a particular interest in physical theater and studied the LeCoq movement and mask technique with David Gaines, clown and commedia dell'arte with Jim Calder, and puppetry with Emily Stork. Wendy is an Assistant Research Scientist with the Institute for Civil Infrastructure Systems, also holds a degree in elementary education and has taught children’s theatrical outreach in Everett, Fall River, Holyoke, MA and conflict resolution through theatre in Springfield, MA. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband, Micah, and their daughter, Samirah.