An interdisciplinary project about artists and architects working together in the city
December 2015 – January 2016
You Are Here is an interdisciplinary project, consisting of new temporary public art works, a one day symposium, and exhibition, to explore future ways of working collaboratively across the fields of art and architecture.
During December 2015, the commissioned artists, Leo Fitzmaurice, Office for Subversive Architecture, and Sans façon brought new temporary artworks to Sheffield. These were presented at the We Are Here symposium, alongside panel discussions led by curators, practitioners and academics.
Contributors included:
Jane Anderson – Models for Practice
Carolyn Butterworth – SSoA
Leo Fitzmaurice
Andreas Lang – public works
Office for Subversive Architecture
Kate Genever – Poly-Technic
Steve Pool – Poly-Technic
Charles Quick – In Certain Places
Elaine Speight – In Certain Places
Tristan Surtees – Sans façon
Charles Blanc – Sans façon
Helen Stratford
Claire Tymon – Placeshakers
Dr Stephen Walker – SSoA
You can find out more about the temporary artworks at the We Are Here exhibition at Live Works, in Union Street, which is running between 25th February – 17th March 2016.
More details about the symposium and artworks can also be found below.
We Are Here Symposium
The symposium ‘We Are Here’ was hosted by The University of Sheffield School of Architecture (SSoA) and brought together 100 artists, architects, students, curators and academics to explore the challenges and opportunities in interdisciplinary collaborations between art and architecture.
Utopia
Leo Fitzmaurice
A public artwork with a difference, Leo Fitzmaurice’s Utopia is a mobile touring sign that travels around the city. Between 20th November – 18th December, MArch students at Sheffield University School of Architecture collaborated with Leo to tour ‘Utopia’ around Sheffield city centre. The sign, placed at carefully chosen sites around Castlegate, refreshes the way we see the city, allowing us to encounter the familiar in a way that unsettles us.
You Are Here
Sans façon
You are here is a slice-of-time experiment into the significance of “being” in the heart of Sheffield. The event involved 1,500 helium-filled balloons in the shape of red arrows being made available to the public at three locations over three days in December. Individuals voluntarily took an arrow balloon with them on their journey and left a trace across the city, revealing the activity of the public realm. Allowing the citizen to become performer, You are here calls attention to everyday movement and exchange. The ubiquitous red arrow − a marker of place and often used to designate “you are here” on a map − is altered to instead mark the people rather than the place.
Wounded Building
Office for Subversive Architecture
Office for Subversive Architecture’s temporary intervention engages directly with Park Hill, a brutalist housing estate in Sheffield City Centre which has been undergoing redevelopment since 2007. The intravenous route is the fastest way to deliver fluids and medications throughout the body; this body of architecture received therapy over the course of a month, between December and January. The process is intended as a statement of breathing life into abandoned architecture which is in the process of being transformed.
Image credits: John Jeong and Johannes Marburg 2015