Macnas nightmares promised for Halloween

Outsiders and misfits, nightmares and dreams will be the stuff of Macnas's first parade this year through the streets of its home city of Galway.

Artistic director Noeline Kavanagh is promising some "iconic imagery, mixed with the unknown and the new" in the Halloween bank holiday weekend event.

The twilight On the Night Journey parade will focus on the mind of Macnas's Boy Explorer, as he pursues three "dream weavers" – a stag, a horse and a hare – and is pursued by his own imagination.

A crowd-funding appeal helped the company to secure the final €10,000 required to stage the event, which it promised for the people of Galway after it failed to secure a billing in this year’s arts festival.

Talks had broken down earlier this year in a disagreement over funding. Macnas had been staging parades as the centrepiece of the Galway arts festival since 1987, with a break for several years when it became involved in theatrical productions.

The company says it is committed to maintaining what has now become a city tradition. On the Night Journey takes place at 4.45pm on October 27th. See macnas.com.