The Sacred Traditions Exhibition
nmcnamara October 15th, 2008
The Sacred Traditions gallery at the Chester Beatty Library exhibits the sacred texts, illuminated manuscripts and miniature paintings from the great religions and systems of belief represented in the collections – Christianity, Islam and Buddhism with smaller displays on Confucianism, Daoism, Sikhism and Jainism.
The Biblical Papyri, the remarkable collection of Qur’an manuscripts and scrolls and books of Buddhist thought provide the focus for the displays.
Arts of the Book, a new permanent exhibition of the Library’s collections opened in May 2008.
Opening Hours: 10am-5pm Tues-Fri; 11am-5pm Saturday; 1pm-5pm Sunday. (closed Mondays Oct-April) visit www.cbl.ie for more information on both exhibitions.
Arts of the Book, a new permanent exhibition of the Chester Beatty Library’s collections, opened on 17 May 2008. On display are books from the ancient world including the world famous Chester Beatty Love Poems (c.1160 BC), Egyptian Books of the Dead, beautifully illuminated medieval European manuscripts and fine European printed books, as well as Old Master prints.
The exhibition also explores the richness of the Islamic manuscript tradition – illustrations and illuminations, calligraphy, and exquisite bindings from across the Middle East and India are exhibited.
Highlights from East Asia include one of the finest collections of Chinese jade books in the world, Japanese picture-scrolls depicting fables and legends, and deluxe woodblock prints.
Audio-visual programmes complement the exhibition, helping the visitor to learn more about the arts of the book throughout the world.
Chester Beatty Library, Dublin Castle, Dublin 2
Phone + 353 1 4070750
To celebrate European Year of Intercultural Dialogue 2008, the Chester Beatty Library and Draíocht Arts Centre, Blanchardstown, are collaborating in a unique project involving primary school children from multi-ethnic backgrounds living in the Dublin 15 area.
The goal of Tell Your Story is to provide positive arts experiences around storytelling in order to build language skills, confidence, arts awareness and multicultural understanding through highlighting commonality and celebrating difference.
The project began on the 31st of March with a field trip to the Chester Beatty Library, and a tour of the library’s collection. Full of inspiration, the children returned to their classrooms to start a series of over 50 workshops in storytelling, poetry and visual arts taking place over six weeks with the project’s skilled artists and practitioners from both organizations.
After six weeks of classroom workshops, the project will finish in Draíocht on Saturday 10th of May, with a Family Day and Exhibition of some of the children’s handmade work including clay face masks, treasure chests and hand-stained and decorated journey scrolls. The families of all 148 children will be invited to Draíocht where the project will be officially closed by Bob Kelly, of RTE’s ‘No Place like Home’.
The entire project is being recorded on DVD by filmmakers Neil Dowling and Paddy Shirley, and each child will receive a copy of the finished film to add to their treasure chest when the project finishes. 
