‘All the things I suspected about the Irish culture scene were true’

Kris Nelson had only ever spent four days in Dublin when he decided to apply for the position of festival director of the Tiger Dublin Fringe Festival. After more than a decade of working in the Canadian theatre industry in Vancouver and Montreal, the time had come for a new professional challenge.

“I wanted to have a chance to really lead an organisation. I wanted to be able to connect with an audience and I feel artistic directors have this chance to shape and lead a dialogue of what’s happening in a city. There was something that propelled me to try for the job in Dublin. I just felt, how many chances am I going to get to jump into a situation like this?”

Growing up in the "small prairie city" of Saskatoon in the central Canadian province of Saskatchewan, Nelson dreamed of performing as an actor on stage. Saskatoon was "big enough to be exciting and a bit glamorous, but small enough to not get into too much trouble", says Nelson. "It's a small farming city that feels like Ireland in the way that you run into people all the time. Prairie people suffer through tough winters, and there's this whole code of helping each other out."

There is no history of theatre in Nelson’s diverse family background of Ukrainian, Norwegian and Irish blood, including members of the Mennonite community on his mother’s side. However, the young performer became determined to pursue a career in the arts during his final year of school. After graduation he moved to Montreal for a year, where he dabbled with veganism and became a food activist before applying to theatre school in Vancouver.

“I knew acting was what I wanted to do, but I also knew I wanted to work in an arts organisation.”

Behind the scenes
As his studies in Vancouver progressed, Nelson realised he was more interested in "how things worked" in theatre. "I found myself more excited by how things operated than actually being in the show and worrying about my lines." He ended up working for Vancouver's Push performing arts festival and in 2007 ran the festival's international symposium.

"I had never travelled, I'd never left North America. We did road trips – we'd drive to the Rockies and go skiing – but I fantasised so much about going abroad. I thought about Europe and Asia a lot."

After producing a theatre festival called Magnetic North, Nelson moved to Montreal to be with his boyfriend and began working on a number of freelance projects. He also worked as an agent and eventually set up his own production and agency company, which allowed him to travel outside North America. "I branded the company 'Antonym' in 2009, and it was amazing. We toured all over the world – Brazil, Japan, Iceland, Germany and Ireland – which is how I found out about the Fringe festival."

In 2013 Nelson applied for the job with the Fringe and was invited to Dublin for the interview. "I remember they offered me the job and I was like, Oh my God, really? I was a little freaked out, so I rented a bike in Phoenix Park and cycled it around to sort my thoughts out." Nelson accepted the position and quickly wrapped up his agency in Montreal. Two months later he arrived in his new Irish home.

Getting to know Dublin has been similar to settling into life in Montreal, he says. “There were different layers in uncovering what Dublin was and what the cultural scene was like. It was like my move to Montreal: I had to pick up on ways of speaking and figure out how people see the city.

“All the things I had suspected about the Irish culture scene resonated as true. For example, I suspected they had an eerily high capability of making very good work and connecting it with the world.”

Nelson says Irish people really value the arts. He was pleasantly surprised by how the Fringe is held in such high regard. He also says the Government’s commitment to the arts via the Arts Council and Culture Ireland is vital. He describes the expansion of the Department of Arts, Heritage, Regional, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs as “unwieldly”, but says speeches from President Michael D Higgins give the arts community hope.

“You look at the fantastic speeches Michael D has been making. He’s an incredible advocate and an incredible speaker, and people love him and care about what he says.

“It’s not Heather Humphreys’ fault, but it’s foolhardy to make a ministry of culture and rural affairs with a couple of other departments in the back. It’s ridiculous because it’s a major sector. I was happy to see the government confirm a name change last week to reflect the priority of the arts to the department, but I think Ireland would benefit even more from a separate ministry dedicated to the arts.”

It’s clear to Nelson that tourists come to Ireland to hear Irish music and see Irish theatre. “Talk to any tourist out there and they’ll say, ‘We’re here to see music, we want to see a show, we want to go to a gig, we want to go to a gallery’.”

He says the arts community can also benefit from the energy behind Waking the Feminists, which is fighting for equality in the arts.

“The committee behind Waking the Feminists has done really hard work . . . If we’re going to look at equality and equity, it has to be across all sectors. We also have to look at cultural inequality, class inequality, ability inequality.”

Ireland took its first steps towards creating a more equal society with last year’s same-sex marriage referendum, he says. “I’ve never seen anything as exciting and as exhilarating as what happened in May last year. It was on everyone’s doorstep and in everybody’s newspaper. There was a thoughtful, intelligent, very vulnerable conversation going on, and the country decided together. For me it was one of the things that changed my relationship to being here.”

In 2013 Nelson came to Ireland to do a job on a “temporal” basis. Three years on, he has developed a deep appreciation for this small Irish capital he now calls home.

“Dublin seemed simple at first but under the surface there were lots of different layers to unravel. There are so many different cities in this tiny city but they all merge in this really cosy way.”

• We would like to hear from people who have moved to Ireland in the past five years. To get involved, email newtotheparish@irishtimes.com. @newtotheparish