Ideas please – making a green hill sustainable in Birmingham. Urgent
Andrew Sprackman has been shortlisted to the final five of the Arts Council Cultural Olympiad project ‘Artists Taking the Lead’ in the West Midlands area. The winner gets £500,000 to produce their project idea in time for the Olympics in 2012. Can you offer any advice on some of the sustainability issues surrounding this project?
My project idea is to build a large grass covered hill in Birmingham and programme it with an eclectic set of artist led events/happenings/artworks/mini festivals for a year running from June 2011 to June 2012 – a ‘space’ for people to have experiences – play, interact, explore, learn, laugh, share, discuss, socialise and more.
I have to present my final case on the 1st October.
The hill offers both an aesthetic juxtaposition with the cityscape, and a space for people to experience and interact. It will be a place for visitors to meet, to sit, to climb up, to roll down, to share and to view and experience the city from a fresh perspective. A programme of activities will take place during the Hill’s ‘life cycle’ including summit photos, concerts, cinema screenings, cheese rolling, nature tours, discussions and star gazing.
The hill’s intention is to create a familiar yet magical intervention in the city that has a constantly changing visual aesthetic and seeks to activate social interactions and fresh experiences.
The work is a reminder of the importance of naïve play, which is often forgotten, discouraged or abandoned as we move into adulthood.
This work also seeks to disconnect the idea of space and its commercial exploitation, and asks is it possible for a space to be a catalyst for ‘micro change’.
The £5.4 million project, ‘Artists taking the lead’, will award up to £500,000 for each of the 12 works in the most ambitious art prize on offer in the UK. It is being developed by Arts Council England, in partnership with London 2012 and the Arts Councils of Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
Artists taking the lead is part of London 2012′s Cultural Olympiad and challenged artists across the UK to submit ideas for works of art to celebrate 2012. It is being delivered and funded by the Arts Councils of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland and will result in twelve commissions, one in each of the English regions and one in each of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Out of the 2163 submissions received across the UK, 59 have been shortlisted, with between 3 and 5 shortlisted commissions in each nation or region.
Links
www.artiststakingthelead.org.uk
www.london2012.com