Friday 25 June 2010

Shaftesbury Open Space Commission

I spent yesterday in Shaftesbury Dorset after being shortlisted for the 'WIDE OPEN SPACE' commission. Shafestbury is famous as the backfrop for the Hovis advert !



The brief was to produce a proposal for a public art project. I would imagine we were shortlisted for a project I and architects civic completed in Burnley where Proposals were used in an iterative way, to gradually build a mandate for the projects we were developing with residents and the council.

My feeling is my presentation of the ideas behind this approach did not translate well to the Shaftesbury Civic society (who made up the interview panel), I just cant get away from the fact that what they really wanted was a stone carved monument, which is fine, but why select me for the shortlist, cabaret perhaps ?

One thing to learn, always check out who the commissioning panel will be and tailor content accordingly - I think I know that but temporarily forget. Hohum.

Monday 7 June 2010

Cornmarket Plaza Commission, Dublin 2010 - A feeling of rejection

Just received a very strange thanks but no thanks email from Dublin City council. This has never happened to me before, but after shortlisting a set of candidates and commissioning them to produce comprehensive proposals, the interview panel, which consisted off:

Anne Graham, (Engineer, ex Central Area Office Manager for DCC – who initiated the commissioning process
· Frances Hegarty, Artist
· Ruairí Ó Cuív, Public Art Manager

have decided - and I quote:

"After carefully examining and assessing all the proposals we have decided that no team offered all the requirements of the commission. Therefore, Dublin City Council will not be nominating anybody for this commission at this time. " mmmm - and interesting development in the role of professional art managers, one where they have to go through with a publicly accountable procedure with little appetite for actually commissioning the work ? certainly one that is very frustrating for all the artists involved and a general waste of resources.