Publications

Commissioning views

By: S Mark Gubb

Public artist or visual artist? Open or closed? Fee-paid or speculative? Drawn from interviews, Mark Gubb brings points of view from public art commissioners and consultants into a debate started by artists in the April issue of a-n Magazine.

What are the key issues for commissioners and consultants? Being advocates for the use of artists in all areas of design, bringing them in early enough to make a difference to the project overall – thus avoiding notions of artist-as-problem-solver. Bringing the artist in right at the beginning allows the project to develop in collaboration between artist/client/engineer etc, avoiding the parameters of the commission becoming too narrow before it even gets out to a brief. “The key issue is how do we ensure that the creative capital of the artist is brought in early enough to make a difference, to add the yeast as it were. This should be a collaborative process and the best of these are when the collaboration begins early enough that the notion of authorship is not the primary concern. Also, both sides need to understand what is meant by professional practice. On the whole, artists are extremely professional, but it can sometimes be problematic when working with larger design teams from a range of disciplines.” Andrew Knight Questioning the need for permanent, formal works as opposed to work that exists for a set period of time and is then decommissioned. By...

. . . to read the rest of this resource

and access all Knowledge Bank and Publication articles subscribe online - from only £6.

Go back »