Some of these faces are already familiar and some are not, but they are all preparing for a big year. Here are our predictions for some to look out for in the months ahead
PAUL MURRAY
Author
Murray, a graduate of Trinity College and of the University of East Anglia's prestigious creative writing Master's course, spent time as a bookseller before publishing his first novel, An Evening of Long Goodbyes, in 2003. The comical story of Dubliner Charles Hythloday, who squanders his family inheritance, fakes his own death and ends up working in a Latvian factory, was shortlisted for the Whitbread Prize and the Kerry Irish Fiction Award. Now Murray is back with a new novel, Skippy Dies, set in a Dublin boys' school, and critics are already marking it up as a must-read for 2010, likely to establish the arrival of a strong voice in Irish fiction.
SEÁN SHERLOCK
Labour TD
Elected in 2007 to the Cork East seat held by his late father, Joe, Seán Sherlock was quick to make his voice heard. A graduate of NUI Galway, where he studied economics and politics, this one-time assistant to Prionsias De Rossa has already spoken out on the issue of judges being exempt from pay cuts. He has also commented that public service salaries over €50,000 must come under scrutiny.
Just 38 years old, he fulminated on behalf of young people at the time of the Budget, saying it was "drafted by silver-haired politicians and mandarins who have their mortgages paid and children reared". He's mild-mannered, outgoing and sincere but there's also a core of toughness that comes to the surface now and again. He's also the Labour Party spokesman on Agriculture and Food.
DARK ROOM NOTES
Music group
The biggest hurdles for Irish bands have always popped up when they venture "out foreign". Countless Irish musicians have conquered their homeland only to fail to sell enough records or tickets elsewhere to make any sort of impact. How Dark Room Notes will fare on their foreign campaign will be interesting to observe in 2010.
Two archaeologists, a photography teacher and a costume designer, the Dublin-based act with Galway roots had a bumper year at home. They received much acclaim and attention for the smart, impressive and enticing electro pop of their debut album, We Love You Dark Matter, and a live show that kept getting better and better.
The group will release the album internationally this year, thanks to a hook-up with Berlin/London label BBE. UK, US and Canadian dates are already in the diary, including a couple of appearances at the hugely important South By Southwest festival in Austin, Texas, in March. All that's required now for Ronan Gaughan, ArraMurphy, Ruairi Ferrie and Darragh Shanahan are a few lucky breaks.
NINA DIVITO
Shoe designer
With the launch of her first footwear collection this month, Divito, the woman better known for her freestyle paintings of high heels, takes her career a step forward. The Dublin-based designer, who is of Italian ancestry, who has a diploma in footwear design from Cordwainers in London and a degree in model-making from Bournemouth's Arts Institute, served her apprenticeship with shoe designer Olivia Morris in London when one of her designs won an Elle magazine competition.
Her debut collection consists of 11 shoe styles, mostly flamboyant stilettos with playful derrieres and decor in nappa leather, suede and silk satin with trims of organdie and ribbon. Irish footwear designers are rare, but this exquisite Italian-made collection, aimed at the luxury market, is a promising start for a new talent. Divito's shoes will be stocked in Brown Thomas and Kalu in Naas from the end of January (prices from €385-€695), and Jemma Kidd will launch the collection in London later in the month.
GRANNY O'GRIMM
Bitter old woman
It was far from happiness Granny O'Grimm was reared, which may explain her bitterness at youth, beauty and even a hint of bonhomie in those around her. She's old, and ostensibly shaky on her pegs, but this 74-year-old from Ballymulch can work up a powerful rage when it suits her. With a shock of grey, gravity-defying hair, and a nose that would take your eye out, O'Grimm is famed for her scary storytelling abilities, and her capacity to ensure that no child will sleep peacefully ever again. And now she's infected Hollywood, too, with the animated short film about her by Brown Bag Films, Granny O'Grimm's Sleeping Beauty, shortlisted for an Oscar this year. Directed by Nicky Phelan and written and performed by Kathleen O'Rourke, the film is on a list of 10 in the Best Animated Short Film category, of which five will be nominated on February 2nd. The full six-minute film can be seen on her website, grannyogrimm.com.
DAN MARTIN
Cyclist
Had it not been for a knee injury, Martin would have made his Tour de France debut in 2009. He had travelled to the start in Monaco, but his Garmin Slipstream team was forced to make a last-minute change. Martin had already shown a rare climbing ability with victory in the 2008 Route du Sud, and a close second to former world number one Alejandro Valverde in the 2009 Volta a Catalunya.
He completed the Vuelta a España in September, and while that didn't go as well as he had expected, due to possible overtraining, he bounced back to take a superb eighth in October's Tour of Lombardy.
Martin is the son of Stephen Roche's sister Maria, and Neil Martin, a former British pro. He is expected to compete in the 2010 Tour. Many predict a big future for him, with some experts believing he has the talent to fight for victory in cycling's toughest races.
FERGUS FEEHILY
Painter
Feehily is a quiet, thoughtful person who makes quiet, thoughtful work. That work, usually small in scale, could be described as painting, though often, as one catalogue note observed, it has little to do with the application of paint. He typically takes a found object, decorative or functional, and amends it by means of a series of careful improvisations, adding and removing elements to it. "I am trying to make something that invites sustained looking," as he puts it himself. Something about his understated, introspective approach suits the spirit of the age. When Jerome O Drisceoil of the Green on Red Gallery brought his work to Basel Miami art show last month, he was amazed at the response, and arising from that Feehily is booked for exhibitions in São Paulo, Tokyo and New York.
NEVEN MAGUIRE
Chef
Could this be the year the Michelin Guide awards its first star to an Irish restaurant beyond the Pale? An inspector called to Maguire's MacNean House and Restaurant in Blacklion, Co Cavan, in June (booking anonymously, he was initially unable to secure a table, and had to be placed on a waiting list), and there are whispers that this could be Maguire's year to find a star beside his name when the new edition of the guide is released in mid-January. But he won't be waiting around for the phone call - he and his wife Amelda are spending January in South Africa, searching for new wines and inspiration for their menus. Maguire, who says 2009 was the best year to date for his restaurant, also has a new 13-part TV series, Home Chef, starting on RTÉ1 on January 7th, and a new book of the same name.
SINÉAD NÍ MHAONAIGH
Artist
Ní Mhaonaigh is a young artist who featured in last year's RHA Futures exhibition at the Gallagher Gallery. Her lyrical, beautifully made paintings are delicately poised between lushness and austerity. Creamy thicknesses of oil paint are held in check by spare, orderly frameworks.
American artist Terry Winters observed that painting is about devising a space for speculation, and that's a good description of what Ní Mhaonaigh does. Early on she was inspired by Pádraic Ó Conaire's stories of Irish immigrants in Britain, and the notion of a communal world, with its rituals and shared meanings and varieties of exile or exclusion from it, is one that recurs again and again in her work.
EAMON GAFFNEY
School principal
It's not often we get to watch those in education at work, but thanks to principal Eamon Gaffney's decision to allow cameras into St Peter's College in Dunboyne, Co Meath, for an entire academic year, we'll all have the privilege in 2010. Gaffney, who grew up in Kildare and began his life as a career guidance teacher, has been principal at St Peter's since it first opened in 1994 with just 72 students.
The school now boasts closer to 1,000 students and is staffed by dedicated teachers, led by Gaffney's belief in a holistic approach to education, putting an emphasis on nurturing an individual's strengths and interests rather than focusing on fast-tracking students to college. Gaffney and his school will feature in a new documentary series called The School, which kicks off on RTÉ1 on Monday at 9.35pm.
GRÁINNE MURPHY
Swimmer
Wexford's Gráinne Murphy has shaped her life around the pursuit of excellence in the swimming pool. At only 16, Murphy has already rewritten many of the long-standing records in Irish swimming in what has been a sensational year. She took three gold medals in the individual medley disciplines at the European Junior Championships in Prague. She also broke two European junior, four Irish senior and 10 Irish junior records during that tournament.
Further Irish records went at the recent European short course championships in Istanbul. Murphy's decision not to wear the polyurethane suit - which will be outlawed by the sport from next year - was significant.
The London Olympics of 2012 are her chief aim. Her coach, Ronald Claes, has described her as "fearless", and her dedication is beyond question. With the support of her family, Murphy has moved to Limerick, where her daily sessions in the University of Limerick pool begin at 6am. She was recently named Texaco Young Sports Star of the Year.
STEVEN TROUGHTON-SMITH
App developer
At 21, Troughton-Smith has already been named as Ireland's most successful app developer, earning up to $1,000 a day from apps he wrote for the iPhone. Among others, he is responsible for Lights Off, a rewrite of a game written by developer Lucas Newman; and Speed, which uses the iPhone's GPS capability to tell you how fast you are travelling.
Troughton-Smith, a computer science student from DCU, has a number of projects worth watching next year. He is currently involved in the development of an application to help children with autism communicate through the iPhone.
CONOR HORGAN
Photographer/director
Well known around Dublin as a photographer and TV commercial director, Horgan has been steadily making his mark on the big screen in recent years, with his short films screened at a number of international festivals such as Cannes, Clermont-Ferrand and Cork.
This month, his first feature, a post-apocalyptic drama called One Hundred Mornings, will play at Utah's Slamdance Festival, which runs alongside the bigger, brasher Sundance festival. It will then be hitting Irish screens in February, as part of the Dublin International Film Festival, where his documentary about portraiture, The Beholder, will also be screened.
Meanwhile, two earlier shorts, Happiness and Fear, will screen back to back at the Irish Film Institute this month, followed by a Q&A session with Horgan.
LEO VARADKAR
Fine Gael TD
Leo Varadkar is the archetypal brash young upstart. First of all, he audaciously snatched a Dublin West seat from the Socialist Party's Joe Higgins in 2007. And within a week of being elected, he went for Bertie Ahern's jugular in a Dáil debate, causing the then taoiseach considerable ire by branding him as "both devious and cunning". Though only 28 when elected, he was given the key enterprise spokesman role, and has since become a pivotal member of the party's highly-regarded economic team. A trained GP, he's the son of an Indian father and Irish mother, and joined Young Fine Gael while still at school in King's Hospital. With a keen eye for publicity, he famously offered to sell his apartment, which is now in negative equity, to Nama, for a price based on its long-term economic value. He has been a prominent Fine Gael voice already, but expect him to be even more so in 2010.
DYLAN TIGHE
Actor/director/writer
Everyone knows Tighe is a man to watch: the question is what to watch him in. This singer, actor, director and writer powered through 2009 with a plethora of projects that left theatregoers dizzy, among them a reworking of Medea at the Gate Theatre in London; the acclaimed site-specific hit of last year's Ulster Bank Dublin Theatre Festival, No Worse There Is None, which he directed; and his solo show Journey to the End of the Night in Absolut Fringe, based on his personal experience on the Trans-Mongolian Express from Beijing to Moscow.
Next year looks set to equally busy, with Tighe zipping off to play Creon in Pan Pan's Oedipus Loves You at the Sydney Festival and at the Brisbane Powerhouse. He'll also be directing The Trailer of Bridget Dinnigan, a new adaptation of García Lorca's The House of Bernarda Alba that updates the classic tragedy to a Travellers' halting site. And all this while continuing work on an album of his own original songs.
JANE NÍ DHULCHAOINTIGH
Inventor
Jane Ní Dhulchaointigh is the woman behind what some are touting as the best invention since Sellotape, a silicone product that can be moulded into any shape, and sticks to all manner of surfaces, and she's given it an Irish name: Sugru, from the Irish word for "play".
Ní Dhulchaointigh studied fine art and sculpture in Ireland before moving to London for an MA in design at the Royal College of Art. It was during her time there that she hit on the principles for Formerol, the material from which Sugru is made.
Having set up her own company to bring it to the market, the result is brand new to consumers, but reaction has already been positive to this modelling clay-like adhesive that retains a slight flexibility even after it has hardened into shape.
JOHN BUTLER
Producer/director
Making good television sketch comedy is no easy task, and when Your Bad Self made a one-off appearance a year ago, it built anticipation through some online clips before backing that up with an excellent selection of sketches that producer and director John Butler described "being about people behaving really nicely in unmentionable situations".
Alongside Butler, its writing and acting includes Eoin Williams, Benedict Kelly, Justine Mitchell, Emily Fairman, Domhnall Gleeson, Peter McDonald, Michael McElhatton, Hugh O'Conor and Amy Huberman. It starts a six-show run on RTÉ2 on Monday, January 11th.
SEAMUS COLEMAN
Soccer player
Picking a decent prospect from among the Irish soccer players in Britain is always fraught with danger. Competition for places, injuries, or a failure to develop can get in the way. There is, though, some real hope that Coleman will come through at Everton, the club he joined from Sligo Rovers. The 21-year-old right-back has already featured in the first team, most notably in a recent man-of-the-match performance against Tottenham Hotspur in which he ignited the game having come on as a substitute.
The Killybegs man has overcome a serious injury that hampered his start at the club and will this year hope to establish himself as something of a regular.
TWO DOOR CINEMA CLUB
Music group
Heavily tipped by tastemakers in the UK, praised to the hilt by pretty much everyone else, and (following a peak performance at Glastonbury) signed to the very cool and credible indie label Kitsune, Bangor/Donaghadee trio Two Door Cinema Club make the world a better place with their fizzy blend of rock, electro, afrobeat and pop.
With a debut album scheduled for release in February, and an Irish tour to follow in early March (alongside UK/European dates), expect these young lads (Alex Trimble, Kev Baird and Sam Halliday) to make their mark.
MICHAEL McGRATH
Fianna Fáil TD
Michael McGrath is a Cork South Central deputy who has been making a name for himself as a bright, young - he turned 33 last summer - and up-and-coming voice, and is becoming increasingly influential within the Fianna Fáil Parliamentary Party. An accountant by profession, he was appointed as vice chair of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance and the Public Service last year, and is also a member of the Public Accounts Committee.
He's a formidable constituency operator, no mean feat when his colleague is Micheál Martin. His biggest assets are that he's thoughtful, strategically strong, and is not a leadership crony.
He could be one of the most prominent new faces to rise to the top in the event of a root-and-branch change.
" Dark Room Notes received much acclaim and attention for the smart, impressive and enticing electro pop of their debut album. How they will fare on their foreign campaign will be interesting to observe
CONTRIBUTORS
Shane Hegarty, Fiona McCann,
Deirdre McQuillan, Donald Clarke,
Aidan Dunne, Harry McGee, Jim Carroll, Shane Stokes, Conor Lally,
Stephen Collins, Mary Minihan, Marie-Claire Digby, Patsey Murphy, Keith Duggan, Ciara O'Brien,
Laura Slattery, Tony Clayton Lea
Acknowledgements
The Dublin City Gallery The Hugh Lane's programme for this year includes:
Francis Bacon: A Terrible Beauty, celebrating Francis Bacon's centenary, continues until March 7th and is accompanied by a series of talks
The Collection Revealed series, providing an in-depth look at pieces from the collection, continues with The Reflective Eye: Artists Observing Artists, March 31st to June 6th. A recent acquisition, Tacita Dean's film Michael Hamburger, will also be showcased
The work of Katie Holten, as part of The Golden Bough will run from January 28th to April 2nd
n Drawing and painting courses for adults begin in January and the ongoing programme of children's workshops and free family events continues throughout 2010
