CHARITY CALENDARS:All sorts of people are stripping off and baring all, or almost all, in the name of charity. ÁINE KERRtakes a peek at the latest batch
FARMERS, HOUSEWIVES AND firemen are among the groups of people risking endless banter and teasing in the spirit of charity. And for 12 months of 2012, they will be continually reminded of their charitable deeds. All posed for free, suppressing their shyness and ignoring their inner doubts, to make some of the most memorable 2012 charity calendars.
The Irish Farmer Calendar
A calendar featuring 12 Irish farmers, resplendent with farmer tans, recently featured on German television, attracting more than four million viewers, and prompting a rapid increase in sales. The Irish Farmer Calendar 2012 is being billed as the follow-up to the original Calendar Girls and the New York Firefighters version, and is being pitched as Irish farmers “manning up” in aid of Irish charity Bóthar. Pictured in their full (or at least topless) glory, along with a piglet, a duck, cows and horses, the calendar has sold everywhere from the US and Australia to the UK, Germany, France and Poland. The “hunks of Irish agriculture” come from Kilkenny, Tipperary, Limerick, Roscommon, Longford, Cork, Kildare, Dublin and Wexford. The calendar is the brainchild of Ciara Ryan of CR Enterprises, based in Dublin.
“The idea for the calendar came about when the recession hit and I was made redundant, and I thought this would be a great idea and a bit of fun. I set about finding our models and placed an ad in the Farmers Journal and college agricultural departments. All of our calendar boys are natural models; no make-up, no additives, no preservatives. And the guys were great craic to work with,” she says. The calendar is now available from farmercalendar.com, costing €10, and from selected retail outlets including Easons, Reads of Nassau Street and Calendar Club.
The Clonakilty Calendar Girls
Pauline Lowney from Clonakilty in Co Cork, a 65-year-old housewife and mother of three who was diagnosed with breast cancer last year, decided only weeks ago to create a charity calendar and immediately set about enlisting friends, relatives and neighbours. “I woke up two weeks ago and I just said, ‘My God, I’m still here and if I can do something to help one person or make people more aware, then I’m going to do it’,” she says.
Sisters, nieces, daughter, friends and neighbours were convinced one-by-one to pose partially naked in aid of Action Breast Cancer. They are aged from their late 30s to mid-70s. During round one, Lowney says her son Alan (who is a hobby photographer) was volunteered to take “very nice lady-like” photos, before her daughter insisted they needed to be “more fun”.
“So we did very funny ones,” says Lowney of the second attempt, before repeatedly declining to say what the pictures look like ahead of the calendar’s release on Monday, December 5th. “It might only make €100 or it might make €5,000. It doesn’t make any difference to us,” adds Lowney. The calendar, costing €10, will be on shelves around Cork from December 5th – just in time for the traditional Christmas shopping day of December 8th.
The Irish Fire Calendar
A panel of female judges decide every year who will feature in the Irish Fire Calendar, based on photographs sent by firemen. In previous years, the Dublin Fire Calendar sold 20,000 copies, making it one of the most popular charity calendars in the world. This year, the calendar has gone beyond the city quarters to recruit firemen from Kildare, Wexford, Galway, Carlow, Louth and Meath, in aid of the charity, 3Ts: Turning the Tide of Suicide. Dublin Airport Authority lends its fire-station facilities for the shoot, and in exchange it gets to pick the charity from petitions it receives every year. Everyone from the models to the photographer give their time free of charge, so all proceeds go to charity.
The calendar costs €10 and is available from irishfirecalendars.com, Calendar Club stores and Dublin Airport Duty-Free Shops. Firemen will also be selling it on Grafton Street and Henry Street in Dublin in the weeks leading up to Christmas.
