Radical Institute (Dr Eve Olney and Dr Krini Kafiris) is a Cork-based, transnational initiative that explores how the arts and cultural practice can promote and sustain radical social and ecological change to transform our social/political movements and create new worlds.

They provide a nurturing environment for participants to unleash their imagination, experiment, learn, collaborate, organise – as well as develop new approaches, practices and tools for ecological, social and community transformations.

They offer collective mentoring and training programmes for cultural practitioners, artists, architects, activists and collectives, including those at risk and/or marginalised — drawing from radical thought and praxis within art, architecture and community building, sustainable organising, as well as from cultural/critical/social ecological theory.

​Their methods are holistic, ecosystemic, feminist and collaborative.

​Radical Institute includes a community space for events, exhibitions and assemblies which aims to foster strong relationships between the Living Commons, existing arts/cultural/community organisations in Cork and Ireland, and an emerging transnational community of practice.

​They fill the current gaps between academic critical thinking, grassroots activism and art / architectural / other creative cultural practices  by operating outside conventional institutional logics according to a culture of care,  and by cultivating multiple ways of knowing, learning and creating.

Rachel Botha is a curator, researcher and arts administrator. Her expanded curatorial practice responds to the local context and investigates how people perceive their social framework. She believes that the responsibilities of a curator are twofold; a facilitator for the artist and a mediator for the viewing audience.

She holds a BA in History of Art & Architecture from Trinity College Dublin, and a MA in Visual Culture & Critical Studies from Technological University Dublin. She was the Provost’s Curatorial Fellow at The Douglas Hyde of Contemporary Art, Trinity College Dublin, a co-director of Catalyst Arts, Belfast, and the Emerging Curator in Residence at the Kilkenny Arts Office. This year she was appointed the Emerging Editor of Bloomers Magazine and edited the publication Genuinely Seeking with contributions by Bridget O’Gorman, Fiona Reilly, Cara Farnan, Lily O’Shea and Radical Institute. She is currently the Early Career Curator in Residence at the Regional Cultural Centre and Glebe House & Gallery in Donegal and has curated Swallowing Geography, a multi-venue exhibition with selected artworks from the Arts Council Collection and newly commissioned artwork by Donegal artists Cara Donaghey, Laura McCafferty, Eoghan McIntyre and Jill Quigley.