The commission started as a CABE initiative, "PROJECT: engaging artists in the built environment", where artists were brought in as part of
regeneration processes.
The inital brief was to propose concrete solutions for 4 areas in town in collaboration with a landscape architect. We expanded these
sites and looked at the overall town and the potential for these locations to become the begining of a process rather than limited interventions.
We undertook a process of research, consultation and design offering a range of opportunities and directions to enhance the existing
qualities and assist in the enhancement of the identity of Peterhead, widening the commission from the 4 sites to the wider town.
The role of the artist became more than the one of a mere producer and provided a creative approach and input to recurrent questions,
and in this case acted as a catalyst for wider engagement.
The process generated a blending of practices, and new multidisciplinary teams, developing spontaneous discussions between artists,
architects, agencies, community initiatives, planners and engineers whilst keeping each individual expertise.
The artist as part of a team is still a rare occurrence. The CABE programme of PROJECT is one of the few programmed that do acknowledge
the validity of such approach. The point of having an artist working as part of the team is to bring another way of looking at similar
issues, sometimes acting as a catalyst for changes.
As part of this project we realised a range of interventions to share the approach and the regeneration:
-occupying a disused shop to present the final research and ongoing developments
-drawing on site at a 1/1 scale the plan of some proposed changes to initiate dialogue
-gathering a series of stories about the place from local people
We have continued working with the Interreg project team under the title of lead artist:
-setting up an international conference to present and discuss the role of artist in
the built environment
-as part of the detail design team
-assisting in the selection of artists
In depth report on the project in
Public Art Online
CABE
Aberdeenshire Arts
Interreg