Public Mural Commissions for The City Gates & Little Wind Street, Swansea
Summary
The City Gates are commissioning a series of public murals to act as an entrance feature to The City Gates & Little Wind Street regeneration scheme. There is an undisclosed budget for design, manufacture and installation. The artist/s will have to provide a budget list for materials and artist fee.
Any questions on budget email City Gates at mtatlock@mansford.com
This is open to artists, art groups & organisations. Selection of artist will be made on evidence of previous work and concept sketch.
Timescale
28th February 2017 Deadline submission of expressions of interest
17th March 2017 Selection of artist
1st April 2017 Installation (there may be potential for earlier/later installation – see ‘location’ below)
About The City Gates/Little Wind Street
The City Gates mural sights are situated on the large building formerly known as Salubrious Place at the end of Wind Street overlooking the A4607 opposite Swansea Museum. The Little Wind Street mural locations are at the rear of the same building in the small street immediately behind the City Gates arches.
The City Gates Project
The City Gates: The scheme, formerly known as Salubrious Place and dominates the eastern approaches to the city centre, is now called The City Gates as it stands close to one of the key entrances to Swansea in the Middle Ages.
The rebranding of the entertainment and eating-out zone at the junction of Victoria Road, York Street and Wind Street is a prelude to an impending revamp designed to create a more continental-style environment with new external lighting, outdoor seating and attractive street furniture.
The area will also become ‘pedestrian-only’ in the afternoons and evenings to improve the experience for customers and diners.
The quarter, built between 2006 and 2007, already includes a hotel, a multi-screen cinema complex, several big name restaurants and Europe’s largest nightclub operator, Deltic, which has invested over £1m in its 1,700 capacity premises.
Taking inspiration from installations such as ‘The Chelsea Arts Club’, as referenced below, we aim to enhance the streetscape and create a sense of place whilst utilising local artistic talent.
Partners: elysium gallery is an artist led, not for profit, social enterprise comprising of 82 studio spaces and a contemporary art gallery over 3 venues in Swansea City Centre, Wales, United Kingdom. We support 13 artists’ studios and a gallery space at 16 College Street, Swansea and a further 13 studios at 2 Mansel Street, Swansea. Elysium gallery also runs a Creative Enterprise Hub of 19 studios, plus 37 studio spaces, a gallery/test bed space, communal library & research areas and artist residency programmes on the upper floors of the Old Iceland building on Swansea High Street.
Elysium gallery also runs various offsite exhibitions and events both locally, nationally and internationally.
elysium gallery seeks to foster a collaborative and participatory experience creating a vibrant and creative community in Swansea. We aim to create the framework for a world of ideas and inspiration, which will feed into the regeneration of Swansea City centre.
Criteria – The Artist
Submitting artists must have:
– A track record of design, manufacture and installation of Mural art
– Your own public liability insurance to cover design and installation
Criteria – The Piece/s
Materials are open for discussion. However this piece has to survive ‘good old fashioned’ Welsh weather. There needs to be a strategy to deal with graffiti (i.e. cleanable or re-paintable).
The intention is to provide striking entry features to one of the busiest areas of Swansea City Centre as it goes through a new phase of regeneration.
Above all we are seeking artistically inventive designs drawing out some of the elements which make this such a special place to visit, socialise and live.
Examples of where this has been successfully implemented are the works at Chelsea Arts Club, London where different artists create striking pieces painted directly on the building. Some sample pieces can be seen below:
There are eight mural spaces for The City Gates location. The artist can send in designs for either for one, two, etc or all eight. Whilst the Little Wind Street location can be considered as one large mural piece or four separate ones.
Submissions:
- Submissions should be emailed to: mtatlock@mansford.com
- Or delivered to: Elysium gallery. 16 College Street, Swansea, SA1 5BH
- To arrive no later than midnight on 28/02/2017
- Include concept sketch of proposal(s) for The City Gates and/or Little Wind Street, details of proposed materials & artist fee
- Provide photos and give locations for at least two previous commissions. If possible at least one of these should evidence work with similar materials and outcomes to those proposed for City Gates/Little Wind Street murals.
- Evidence of public liability insurance
