Priors Hall to get its own public art

More in Corby and Fermynwoods Contemporary Art are looking for an artist to create public artwork to enhance the environment at Priors Hall which will eventually have 5,100 homes.

A panel of residents of the estate will help select the artist.

Fermynwoods Contemporary Art is acting as a creative consultancy to support the panel as they commission the work, which is being overseen by Made In Corby s part of the Arts Council’s Creative People and Places programme.

It is hoped that the artist chosen will be able to create three pieces of art that link three distinct areas of the estate - Town Gardens, Weldon Lakes and Rockingham Gate.

The project, which has recently been rocked by its owners BeLa Partnerships going into administration, is five years into a 15-year building programme.

A specification states: “Because the homes have been built around 3 separate but connected areas, the residents are keen that the artwork acts as a link between them.

“They are therefore interested in proposals that include separate elements for each village, that would form a single visual or other kind of narrative (such as a series of dovecotes, a family of deer) with the possible option of adding a further two components to the work when the remaining areas of housing have been built.”

The artists could also be guided by work that reveals the history of the former ironworks quarry or its submerged Roman Villa.

The artwork will be semi-permanent and therefore will need to be environmentally resistant as well as physically approachable so that it can be experienced close up without being easy to climb or damage.

One of the main aims of the residents’ panel is to make art accessible to the diverse communities speaking 18 languages who call Priors Hall Park their home, as well as to reflect and maintain a sense of traditional British village life. The area is home to species of animals and plant life such as deer, the cinnabar moth, the bee orchid, wild honeysuckle and red kites.

A shortlist of artists will be selected from expressions of interest and will be invited to visit the site in January. The deadline for expressions of interest is December and the local panel will review the long list of artists in mid-December before inviting three finalists to view the site.

There is more information here