DIGBETH PUBLIC ART PROJECT

Visitors to the new National Express Coach Station in Digbeth, Birmingham opening October 2009, will also get to experience a dramatic new work of art at 190 metres long and reaching between 2.2 - 6 metres high.  The red ‘fencescape’, both form and function which will act as a perimeter to the site, dramatically lit at night it and spanning Digbeth High Street, Bradford Street, Rea Street and Mill Lane. The coach station is one of the main entry points to the city with 1.5 million arrivals and departures per year. The new £15 million station is scheduled to be completed towards the end of 2009.

In May 2008, National Express appointed local company EC-Arts to implement and project manage a public art strategy that would not only involve the community within the process, but would also leave a permanent visual legacy for the future.

The project is being developed in two stages.

During the first stage, EC arts were appointed to manage the project, and commissioned lead artists Rob Colbourne and Stuart Mugridge to research & develop a concept relevant to Digbeths heritage.

The aim of the project was to commission public artworks that could be sited at the Station, and also be recognised alongside other iconic landmarks of the city of Birmingham. The art works had to celebrate the unique culture and history of the local community, and provide a balance between past and present.

The fencescape is just one element of the project, providing a futuristic structure that also acknowledges the coach sites industrial past as both HQ for Midland Red coaches and former home to scales manufacturer Avery. The 320 steel haunches form and curve are designed to give notions of balance, flow and transition, while the colour is a reference to both Averys weighing apparatus and the famous Midland Red.

The structure is also a visual representation of how the stations structure itself had been turned inside out. The fence will be made of individual vertical strips of steel that lean, and so change shape, as visitors move around the fence. From passing it at different angles and perspectives, it can seem to be quite solid, but as people walk along it, they will see that gaps appear between haunches. Each strip will be painted with red enamel gloss and be lit from beneath by spotlights, to play with both shadows and light.

Above image: prototype of fencescape to test lighting strategy

The completion will see 320 of pictured haunches standing at a minimum of 2.2 meters tall rising to 6 meters.

It had to be something that was responsive to the history of the site but was also contemporary looking; it's about continuing references artist Stuart Mugridge.

The 300,000 project will be funded by National Express with contributions from Birmingham City Council and the Birmingham Irish Forum and Irish Quarter Regeneration.

The second phase of work will further develop and realise the boundary fence proposal, as well as creating opportunities for new artworks within the coach station site and continued to engagement with the Digbeth community. Site contractors Ashfords have also offered to provide a mentoring role in construction and fabrication processes to the lead artists.

The second phase will also include a video installation inside the station building itself, where passengers and visitors can watch footage showing the sites rebirth and development. The film, along with a planned visual installation on the side of architect Glen Howells offices in Bradford street, adjacent to the new building, have both been developed with the involvement of a group of local schoolchildren as part of their Arts Awards studies.

A Spanish artist will also create a new sculpture, site specific for the office reception, in the shape of an old-fashioned bus conductor.

Project Manager Claire Farrell from EC Arts, said: National Express have invested a huge amount of money in both the coach station and the public art strategy. By developing an arts project themselves, rather than buying a piece of off the shelf art that is irrelevant to the local community, the coach station and Birmingham will be getting public art that has a sense of place.

Clive Dutton, Director of Planning and Regeneration at Birmingham City Council, said: This is an early and brilliant visual project that relates to what the Big City Plan is all about. It's great that we can polish the design for the new coach station and complement the £1 million environmental enhancement scheme; all that demonstrates our contribution to Digbeth, one of the real jewels in the crown of the city.”