With the announcement of the £15m ‘Tees Valley Giants’ commissions to
Anish Kapoor and Cecil Balmond — ‘the world’s biggest public art
project’ — the role of public art in Britain remains as topical and
controversial as ever.
In Leeds, sound and light artist Hans
Peter Kuhn has been commissioned to design a major new work for the
‘Light’ Neville Street project to be unveiled in 2009. The £4.6 million
project is an exciting and innovative regeneration scheme focusing on
the main gateway entrance to the city, funded by a unique partnership
between Leeds City Council, Yorkshire Forward and the Northern Way Arts
Programme. Kuhn has staged projects all over the world, from Japan to
Australia, Europe to North and South America. In his work, sound and
light interact with architecture and a range of indoor and outdoor
spaces, often on an expansive scale.
Since 1992, Kuhn has been
collaborating with photographer Gerhard Kassner — both are based in
Berlin and met whilst working in the theatre — to document these
projects in a series of impressive images. As many of Kuhn’s
installations have been temporary, Kassner’s images both provide a
documentary record of what happened, but also give a permanence to the
projects. They also answer the technical challenges of capturing light
works in surroundings and conditions which are sometimes impossible to
control, with great dexterity.
The exhibition at PSL consists
of around 40 large-scale panoramic photographs by Kassner documenting
Kuhn’s work. With their saturated colour and strategic viewpoints, they
eloquently convey drama and excitement of encountering Kuhn’s work in
the flesh. Kuhn’s works themselves take us back to that ongoing
conversation around the notion of ‘public art’, and its role in
contemporary urban life. We may still think of public art as something
permanent and solid — probably figurative, possibly commemorative, made
of traditional materials such as bronze and so on — but Kuhn’s works
show the way to a radical alternative. Constructed of the most
ephemeral materials (sound and light), they allow for a new
responsiveness to architecture and site which is theatrical and
evocative, with the possibility for a deepened understanding and sense
of place.
With the forthcoming unveiling of the ‘Light’
Neville Street project, this introduction to Kuhn’s work frames a wider
discussion about the relationship between art and architecture, light
and sound in the cityscape, and how to frame the city in intangible
materials as opposed to the monumental, permanent public sculpture and
materials of the past.
For more information about the 'Light' Neville Street project visit www.holbeckurbanvillage.co.uk/nevillestreet
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Left to right: PSL's Kerry Harker, Cllr Andrew Carter, Gerhard Kassner and Hans Peter Kuhn
Light Neville Street
Ohne Titel, installation 1992, Kuenstlerhaus Bethanien Berlin
Det frosne Fakkeltog, installation 2005, Munkemose / Eventyrhaven-Parks
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