Sue Palmer and Simon Lee Dicker explore the art of place making in Langport, Somerset, UK, with a focus on the public and civic spaces in the town. Both Simon and Sue are Somerset-based contemporary public artists who have been invited by Somerset Art Works to make some process based work in Langport that invites the residents of the town to engage with ideas about how public spaces could be more creatively used, and ‘owned’ by the community.
Tuesday, 5 October 2010
the living room
Food for thoughts, a piece of cake for ideas about local public space.
During the day the space was a creche, a youth club, a dog walkers rest, a lunch spot... a social space.
The first person to visit us in our living room on Cocklemoor was 8 months pregnant and fell asleep on the sofa. Her dreams were considered to be part of the work.
This Garden...
'THIS GARDEN WAS DONATED BY TESCO STORES LTD TO LANGPORT TOWN COUNCIL FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE RESIDENTS OF LANGPORT'Using flowers bought from the market under the Town Hall, Debbie said: she will have to say to her supplier “They are for a wedding” – that way they’ll be open for the Saturday. “No point in saying they are for art”.
As well as creating the memorial, questioning the history, politics and ownership of 'public space, we made a number of rubbings from the memorial stone. Images will be posted later.
Urban Jungle School
We invited Hannah Aitkin to run a forest school workshop that encouraged young people and families to build and decorate shelters in the centre of Langport. The activities encouraged a re- visioning of how the outdoor space in cocklemoor could be used for temporary events and gave us a chance to chat to participants about their aspirations for the public space around the town.
Monday, 4 October 2010
Who did this?
A virus is taking over Langport. Lampposts all over the town are appearing as if they have been coloured by a drunken guerrilla painter trying to ‘brighten’ the place up. It doesn’t work. Bad painting, poor choice of colours and a seeming disregard for what is painted makes this a naive and ill considered attempt to make any serious difference to how public space could be improved.
This said, there is obviously a real desire to use ‘art’ to make a difference to the look and feel of Langport, which I am whole heartedly behind.
I have found out whom the ‘guerrilla’ is, don’t ask, I am sworn to secrecy. I have offered some guerrilla training so that any future interventions would be more considerate, less vandalism.
Thankyou
A big thanks to everyone that has been involved over the past six weeks, and to all of you that came to our Langport 'open studio' event over the weekend. The cake proved to be a good catalyst for dialog and we are buzzing with creative ideas for the physical and social life of Langports public open spaces. Watch this space.
Thursday, 23 September 2010
Urban Jungle School Workshop
As part of the ‘Around Here’ event in Langport on Saturday 2nd October we are pleased to announce a free Urban Jungle school drop-in workshop on Cocklemoor between 10am - 1pm. We look forward to seeing you for a bit of den building and drawing.
Tuesday, 14 September 2010
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