ixia

A place for creativity?
Inspiring urban change: Innovative approaches to place design & development

3rd annual Art and Urban Design Conference
Thursday 15th July 2010
One-day national conference at Milton Keynes Gallery, Midsummer’s Boulevard, Milton Keynes

This conference was organised by RUDI in partnership with Milton Keynes Gallery & David Lock Associates in order to bring together all those involved in placemaking and art and design that have an interest in creating unique, interesting and stimulating places.

In times of economic restraint it is particularly important that we encourage creativity in placemaking and develop inspiring and interesting urban environments.

In recent years, RUDI has encouraged discussion about the role artists and the creative community can play in the design, development and delivery of vibrant, culturally relevant and inclusive communities.

Highlights:

* Strategies for urban change
* Artists & the arts on the placemaking agenda
* Contemporary arts in city development
* Reclaiming abandoned & neglected urban areas

Designated as a ‘new town’ in 1967, the rapidly growing city of Milton Keynes now faces new challenges and will provide a focus and stimulus for debate and discussion on the day.

Debate will focus on the role of artists and the creative community in making places, the effects of the recession on creativity in placemaking, collaborative working practices and ways of engaging local communities in the creation of inspiring and interesting places.

Speakers include:

* Will Cousins, Architect, Urban Designer & Director, David Lock Associates
* Richard Russell, Director, Strategic Partnerships, Arts Council England
* Michael Stanley, Director, Modern Art Oxford
* Michael Pinsky, Artist
* Liza Fior, Director, MUF Architects & Artists

and many more… Click here.

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What’s art got to do with it? Creativity in housing and public realm development

Tuesday 15th June 2010, 9.30am-3.15pm
Location: ACE Centre, Cross Street, Nelson, Lancashire, BB9 7NN

What does contemporary art have to do with sustainable, well-designed housing and the public realm? A series of visionary but practical case studies contrasting Housing Market Renewal Arts Programmes from across the UK.

Each region has developed a different approach to embedding creative practice in the mainstream regeneration of some of the country’s most challenging and most characterful neighbourhoods.

The day sought to explore and exchange these accrued areas of expertise in formal presentations followed by a restricted number of Master Classes where delegates and speakers could discuss, in depth, how to apply and carry forward these insights.

The conference was aimed at those who design, plan, develop or build houses, as well as artists and commissioners of artists.

Speakers:
Richard Hollinshead - Director, Grit & Pearl - consultants to Barrow Regeneration and Britain’s Energy Coast West Cumbria
Paul Kelly - Housing Market Renewal Public Realm Project Manager, Liverpool Biennial
Clare McManus - Director, Eventus - the arts agency for Sheffield’s Creative Futures Pathfinder
Anthony Preston - North West Senior Manager, Regional Planning, Arts Council England
Max Steinberg - Chief Executive, Regenerate Pennine Lancashire
Fiona Sullivan - Director, Right Angle Management Ltd.
Claire Timon - Creative Community Engagement Manager, Regenerate Pennine Lancashire

FUNDED BY ARTS COUNCIL ENGLAND

Hosted By Regenerate Pennine Lancashire

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ixia was pleased to support Locating the Producers:

LOCATING THE PRODUCERS - A Time and Place for Public Art

Friday 11th June, 6-8pm
Arnolfini, Bristol
Tickets: £6.00/£4.50 concs

Organised by award-winning public art commissioning programme Situations, at the University of the West of England, in partnership with Bristol City Council, LOCATING THE PRODUCERS - A Time and Place for Public Art offered the opportunity to hear from some of Europe’s most pioneering curators, artists and art producers working in the public realm.

Together, this distinguished group of public art specialists have participated in Locating the Producers, a three-year European research project led by GWR Research Fellow, Dr. Paul O’Neill at Situations in collaboration with ProjectBase and the University of Falmouth incorporating Dartington College of Art. This discussion sees the culmination of intense research into five exemplary public art projects: The Blue House (Het Blauwe Huis), IJburg, The Netherlands (2004-2009); Beyond, Leidsche Rijn, The Netherlands (1999-2009); Trekroner Art Plan, Roskilde, Denmark (2001-on-going); Grizedale Arts, Cumbria, UK (on-going since 1999) and The Edgware Road Project, London, UK (2009-2011).

The participants of these initiatives are being together for the final time in Bristol to debate how their longer-term, cumulative approaches to producing art projects outside museums and galleries have emerged in stark contrast to the short-term festival or parachuting of artists into specific places. The discussion will explore how the individual curatorial models and strategies involved in each project have been developed for their specific socio-political contexts, taking account of the multiple challenges and conflictual attitudes to working in this way for commissioners, curators, artists and their publics.

For everyone interested in the future of public art, this event offers the opportunity to get under the skin of a range of longer-term projects and the chance to quiz the producers on the impact of their projects on specific places over time.

Speakers:
Jonathan Banks - Chief Executive, ixia, public art think tank
Kerstin Bergendal - Artist-Commissioner, Trekroner Art Plan, Denmark
Tom van Gestel - Commissioner, Beyond and SKOR - Foundation for Art & Public Space, Amsterdam
Janna Graham - Curator of Edgware Road, London and member of art collaboration, Ultra-red
Jeanne van Heeswijk - Artist-curator, The Blue House, IJburg
Alistair Hudson - Co-Director, Grizedale Arts, Cumbria
Aldo Rinaldi - Senior Public Art Officer, Bristol City Council
Dr. Mick Wilson - Artist, Writer, Dean of the Graduate School of Art & Design (GradCam), Dublin

Moderator:
Dr. Paul O’Neill - GWR Research Fellow, Situations, University of the West of England, Bristol

Locating the Producers is supported by Projectbase, University College Falmouth incorporating Dartington College of Arts and funded by Great Western Research (GWR).

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Public Art Professional Development Seminars

For 2009 and 2010, ixia worked with Situations, Places Matter! and Arts Council England to develop and deliver two series of Seminars in order to disseminate its research and encourage networking and debate. The Seminars were devised for artists, curators, public art consultants and representatives of public and private sector organisations that promote and commission public art. In addition to hearing from speakers, attendees were encouraged to engage actively in discussions and to reflect upon their own work in relation to the issues discussed.

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Envisioning Community: Space, Place and Translating the Past in 19th and 20th Century Britain

University of Warwick
Saturday 27th February 2010

Envisioning Community was a one-day multidisciplinary conference exploring how approaches to the study of community can better inform our understanding of the historical past. It featured renowned keynote speakers in the fields of historical and human geography, as well as in the field of visual media and its interpretation. The conference was open to delegates from all disciplines, engaging with the processes of space and place in community in nineteenth and twentieth century Britain.

Understanding location as a process has led to a reassessment of historical study. This has been informed by the new challenges of the global in which interrogation of the universal has led to questions regarding the local.  Methodologically, this has given rise to new developments. Scholars wishing to reconstruct and ‘pull apart’ the narratives of social space have recognized the benefits of adopting interdisciplinary methods and sources. This has led to reconsideration of the role of literary and visual representations in the construction and making of ‘imagined’ space, and in the dissection of the relationship between community and human action. Yet, while theory has begun to inform historical practice, the application of interdisciplinary tools and methodologies falls behind.

The object of the conference was to tackle these issues. It interrogated spatially related communities: how the inhabitants of the same streets or towns constructed, responded to and used their physical locations to forge a shared sense of identity, or to bring about social and political change. It also served as a practical forum: promoting and debating the value of interdisciplinary practices, methodology and application in ‘envisioning community’ and reassessing history. The conference aimed to build on the challenges wrought by the ’spatial turn’: exploring not only how the study of space and location enriches our telling of the past, but how the use of interdisciplinary methods and approaches to community can benefit our understanding of the ‘lived’ past.

The conference was designed to appeal to scholars from many disciplines, history, art, film and television, translation and literature, sociology and politics.  With the underlying aim of exploring practice it was intended to be a challenging workshop-style conference which fully interrogated methodologies of translating communities from the nineteenth century to the present.

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Future Perfect: Art, Gallery Education and Regeneration
engage/enquire International Conference

4-6 November 2009

Toynbee Studios and venues across London
http://www.engage.org/conference

Future Perfect took place in the ever-changing landscape of East London. Experts in architecture, future thinking and archaeology joined an international lineup of writers, artists, educators and curators to explore the role of visual arts organisations and artists in observing and shaping the places where people live and work. The event included keynote speakers, case studies, breakout sessions, practical workshops and plenty of opportunities for networking and discussion.

Contributors included: Kerstin Bergendal, Artist, Art Plan Trekroner; CAMP; Clare Cumberlidge, Co-director, General Public Agency; James Dixon, Archaeologist, University of Bristol; Claire Doherty, Director, Situations; Paul Domela, Programme Director, Liverpool Biennial; Danielle Duggan, Design Matters; Karen Eslea and Sarah Martin, Head of Learning and Head of Exhibitions, Turner Contemporary; David Gunn, Director, Incidental; Anna Harding, Chief Executive, SPACE; Sophie Hope; Donald Hyslop, Head of Community Partnerships and Regeneration, Tate Modern; Malcolm Miles, Professor of Cultural Theory, University of Plymouth and author of Cities and Cultures; muf, Architects and Artists; Laura Oldfield Ford, Artist and author of ‘zine Savage Messiah; Jennie Savage, Artist; Iain Sinclair, Author of Hackney, That Rose-Red Empire; Marijke Steedman, Head of Education, Whitechapel Gallery; Adam Sutherland, Director, Grizedale Arts; Charlie Tims, Demos Associate and Co-author of The Dreaming City; Ultra red, International collective.

Visit http://www.engage.org/conference for information about the conference theme, speakers, breakout sessions and accommodation. Click here to download the conference flyer.

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Briefing Sessions to launch Ian Dove QC’s Advice 2009 - Public Art and the Planning System

Over the last ten years the planning system has been, and continues to be, reformed to support the delivery of the Government’s Sustainable Communities agenda - the social, economic and environmental development of places. Over the same period, public art has become seen as a key ingredient in the success of development and regeneration initiatives. Therefore, ixia, in partnership with international legal practice DLA Piper LLP, has sought the advice of Ian Dove QC at No5 Chambers on the relationship between public art and the planning system. The last time this was done was in 1988 by Robert Carnwath QC.

To help people understand the Advice, free briefing sessions were held at three locations across the country. Ian Dove QC; Jonathan Banks, CEO of ixia; and David Brammer, of DLA Piper, provided an overview of the current position of public art within the planning system and talked through the Advice and its implications, took questions and encouraged debate.

Monday 14 September 2009, Birmingham - 12 noon
Monday 28 September 2009, Leeds - 12 noon
Monday 12 October 2009, London - 8:15am

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Art & Architecture Journal / British Ceramics Biennial Conference
Ceramic City - Design for Public Space

Friday 9 October 2009 - Ceramic City Conference
10am-5pm
Saturday 10 October 2009 - British Ceramics Biennial Bus Tour
10am-2pm
Potteries Museum & Art Gallery, Bethesda St, Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent ST1 3DW

In partnership with the British Ceramics Biennial.  3 October - 13 December 2009
www.britishceramicsbiennial.com

Stoke-on-Trent is one of a network of European Ceramic Cities, and this conference was planned to give voice to those working with ceramics in the public realm. Speakers included the architect Ted Cullinan, Samantha Hardingham talking about Cedric Price, Francoise Schein from the Paris-based Association Inscrire, Lara Taves from Atelier Azulejaria, Rio de Janeiro, and exhibiting artists Stephen Dixon, Gwen Heeney and Vicky Shaw. The second day was based on tours of the Biennial exhibitions and associated events, as well as having an opportunity to experience the City’s heritage and potential. The conference themes were further developed in the associated issue of the Art & Architecture Journal, published in September.

http://www.stokeceramicsfestival.co.uk/stories/968-platform_conference

Click here to download a conference flyer.

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A Place for Creativity?
Unlocking the original in urban design and development

A national one day conference from RUDI & Places Matter
The 2nd art & urban design conference, 16th June 2009
The Lowry, Salford Quays, Greater Manchester

• Collaborations: Can Artists, Architects & Urban Designers Work Together?
• Identity & Individuality: True Creativity
• Community Connections: Avoiding Elitism
• Funding & Sponsorship: Who Pays & How?

As the leading resource and knowledge sharing network for urban design and placemaking, RUDI believes that there is an important emerging agenda for how art and the creative community are involved in the planning, design, development and delivery of vibrant, culturally relevant and inclusive communities.

The challenge extends across both the physical design and the animation and use of place, in particular the public realm.

‘A Place for Creativity?’ took place in Salford, Greater Manchester on 16th June, organised by RUDI in partnership with Places Matter!, an Architecture & Built Environment Centre for the North West of England.

In 2008, RUDI, in partnership with Public Art South West, organised ‘Fairytale or Horror Story… Artist & Urban Designer Collaborations: What Value do they bring?’ to look at artist and urban designer collaboration. Following the success of the event, held in Bristol and attended by over 120 people, this second national event is being organised to take forward the debate on the role of artists and the creative community in placemaking.

To listen to the sessions, click here to be redirected to RUDI’s website.

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3rd National Public Art Conference
Art in Public: The Culture of Possibilities

Broadway Media Centre, Nottingham
7th December 2007

The 3rd National Public Art conference presented the role of art, culture and architecture as catalysts for change in shaping regional identity, focusing on projects in Corby and Nottingham.

The event investigated artists’ responses and interventions to civic culture and the challenge of architectural and environmental regeneration. It examined how art and culture-led approaches can provide wider social and economic benefits for people, places and communities.

For further information click here.
To download the conference brochure, click here.

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Art in Public: Sculpture Parks & Land Art Commissions

Yorkshire Sculpture Park, West Bretton, Wakefield

Friday 2nd November 2007 - Conference: with more than 120 dedicated sculpture parks, trails and gardens in the UK, this conference examined this expanding phenomenon.

Saturday 3rd November 2007 - YSP Walkabout: The second day included a tour led by YSP staff of the sculpture park, Longside Gallery and the Andy Goldsworthy exhibition.

For further information, click here.
To download the conference brochure, click here.

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Building Cultures: Can Artists Make Great Places?

Birkbeck College, University of London, Bloomsbury, London WC1E
Thursday 20th September 2007

Part of London Design Festival and Urban Design Week 2007

Creativity, Culture and Change were the themes of a one-day conference on leading regeneration projects through art and creativity with a focus on the mega-development at Kings Cross. The event included presentations of Artists for Places - a partnership between CABE, A&B and Arts Council England; an evaluation by Comedia on the PROJECT scheme to support public art strategies embedded within the planning system; an open forum with key speakers on art, architecture, landscape and planning, debating the role or art and cultural activity within the design of the built environment.

For further information, click here.
To download the conference brochure, click here.

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Building Cultures Urban Walkabout

Friday 21st September 2007

The Building Cultures Urban Walkabout offered a choice of two guided tours around Kings Cross or along the Euston Road charting previous public realm commissions and interventions and revealing the physical and social landscape within which the new art and cultural activity will be sited. The walk was followed by lunch, discussion and debate drawing together the themes of the conference with the issues and opportunities arising in Kings Cross.

For further information, click here.
To download the conference brochure, click here.

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2nd National Public Art Conference
The City in Transition: Art in the Public Realm and the Creation of a Vibrant Civic Culture

Liverpool
17th November 2006

The 2nd National Public Art Conference focused on issues of place-making and transformation within the contemporary urban renaissance together with the role of art, media and culture as catalysts for change in shaping regional identity. The conference offered a creative, progressive and positive vision of art to the regeneration agenda with case studies, documentation and discussion. Key speakers from art, media, architecture and property provided current information on how art and culture-led approaches, working across disciplines, are influencing the built environment.

Organised by Art & Architecture Journal and Landor Conferences and supported by ixia.

For further information, click here.
To download the conference brochure, click here.
For a CD Rom of the papers, please visit: www.landorconferences.co.uk

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The Public Garden: Art - Landscape - Environment
The Effect of Art and Regeneration in Shaping Green and Public Spaces

18th October 2006

The Public Garden conference was concerned with the collaboration of landscape architects and designers with artists on public realm projects. It explored the current experience of visual art programmes, installations and events, looked at the effect of art and regeneration in shaping experiences of rural and urban parks, considered projects for diverse natural and managed green public and private space.

Other highlights:

• Utilising art and environment for tourism and marketing
• The artist as mediator and catalyst
• The role of local authorities
• Ecological and sustainable use of open spaces
• Collaborative and interdisciplinary ways of working
• New and ambitious art + landscape schemes
• Wastelands regeneration projects

For further information, click here.
To download a conference brochure, click here.
A CD ROM is available which contains: copies of all speaker presentations; audio of all speakers presentations and question and discussion sessions; and speaker biographies and any additional papers they have supplied. Please visit www.landorconferences.co.uk.

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How was it for you? Assessing Impact of Artists’s Practice in the Public Realm

4th October 2005

This event was held at the Mechanics Theatre, Manchester Rd, Burnley on Tuesday 4th October 2005. Co-organised with Mid Pennine Arts this one day event explored the evaluation of public art practice in the context of live projects.
The agenda included :

• Catherine Ward-Thompson (OpenSpace Research Centre) talking on evaluation of public art practice
• Nick Hunt (Mid Pennine Arts) & TonkinLiu Architects talking on the Panopticons Project
• A site visit to one of the Panopticon sites

Documents can be downloaded by clicking on the links below:

• Event Flyer
• Agenda
• Full Transcript

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Public Art: Regeneration, Diversity & Engagement

Think Tank, Millennium Point, Birmingham
15th March 2005

This one day event for those engaged in the commissioning, production and mediation of public art and the built environment explored current practice in the context of regeneration, engagement and diversity. The agenda for discussion was introduced in a series of papers contributed by artist Pervaiz Khan, Katherine Clarke from MUF and Noha Nasser from the University of Central England, all of whom facilitated the working groups on the day. The day was chaired by Wendy Shillam of Shillam & Smith Architecture and Urbanism.

Regeneration, Diversity & Engagement, March 2005-Speaker’s biographies

The speakers’ papers can be downloaded here:
Pervaiz Khan
Katherine Clarke
Noha Nasser

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Audience & Place: current research projects exploring impact and identity within public art practice

Milton Keynes
October 2004

A one day event held in Milton Keynes with contributions from Gillian Rose & Doreen Massey, (Open University); artists Jacqui Rodger and Jayne Murray; Tim Hall, (University of Gloucestershire) and Anna Douglas (Independent Curator & Researcher).

To download the event flyer, click here.
To download the Speakers’ Biographies, click here.

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Designs on our Environment?
Establishing multi-disciplinary working Practice

Arup Offices, Bristol
22nd April 2004

A one day event held in Bristol and a collaboration with Public Art South West. Speakers: Philip Singleton, Design Advisor, Birmingham City Council, Artist Nayan Kulkarni, Maggie Bolt from PASW and Dominic Murphy from Creating Excellence. To read the full transcript of the conference on the PASW website, please click here.

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Should I stay or Should I go?

December 2003

A one day event held in partnership with Canterbury City Council considered the issues surrounding the decommissioning of public art. The event marked the launch of a new research study supported by the City Council and the Arts Council of England. Speakers included: Jon Rowland, Andrew Knight, Hazel Colquhoun and Sam Wilkinson.

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Participatory Public Art

June 2003

An event with Fusion Arts Oxford exploring the complex relationship between participatory practice and conventions of commissioning. To read the event flyer, please click here

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National Conference Creative Space

April 2003

A one day event bringing together representatives from the built environment, research and artistic practice in order to discuss future possibilites of public art practice to establish a dialogue that created an opportunity for NEW THINKING, NEW PARTNERSHIPS and NEW WORK. For the full Conference Programme, click here.

The Keynote Speech was given by Mel Gooding and artist John Newling was invited to make a response to the day’s proceedings.

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If you always do what you have always done the future will look a lot like the past

October 2002

A collaboration with Midland Architecture and the Designed Environment (MADE) and Public Art West Midlands (PAWM). Click here to download the Conference Invitation. To download the conference Information Sheet, click here.

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Public Art in the Landscape

Ramsbottom, Greater Manchester
March 2002

In collaboration with the Irwell Sculpture Trust.

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Beyond the Angel - Public Art and Regeneration

January 2002

In collaboration with Northern Arts.

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Public Art and Cultural Diversity - towards an inclusive practice

October 2001

In collaboration with Public Art Leicester and Leicester City Council. Supported by East Midlands Arts.

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National Conference: Emergence

October 2001

A one day conference to explore the changing nature of artistic practice in response to emerging technology.
The Auditorium at Bloomberg, Finsbury Square, London.
Speakers: Lia Ghilardi, Matt Locke, Clive Gillman, John Rouse.

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National Conference: The Benefits of Public Art

RIBA, London
March 2000

This symposium was held by the Public Art Forum at RIBA London in March 2000. It looked at conceiving and evaluating the benefits of public art in a complex environment.
Speakers: Jos Boys, Fred Manson, Gavin Jones.

Click here to download the report.