Whose meaning is it anyway?

One of the things I’ve been thinking about recently is how meaning/s at heritage sites can become fixed as chosen stories/histories are told over and over. I see this in the anxieties and resistance to changes that I encounter. It’s entirely understandable of course, but if the past is to be relevant to people’s lives today and we genuinely want to work with a range of different creative practitioners, then we have to be open to other perspectives, other meanings being attributed to what is already considered ‘known’.

When Robert Adam designed Croome’s Long Gallery, he had a particular idea and aesthetic in mind, and it would have been the most modern of ideas and aesthetics in the late C18th. And the room would have been used in a particular way by his client. But what will 10 artists make of it and how will their work alter the way the room, its aesthetic and purpose are perceived over the next two years? Some see it as a threat, but I think it will open things up at Croome in a new way and I’m curious and slightly impatient to see what new meanings might be exposed through their work.

Preserving Heritage/Preserving Beauty

Last Saturday I went to the opening of Jack's gallery and dark room space in Heath Town, Wolverhampton. It's impressive how far his Redeveloped and Redefined project has developed in nearly a year, with strong links now to Black Country Make and Re-Entry. The gallery got a good review in the local paper, as well as a post on Facebook.

Part of the project is about Jack developing his own photography, and the part of it is about

working with the local community to capture Heath Town with photography, before it is 'regenerated'. It struck me that when all these flats are knocked down in two years time, another slice of that part of British post-war heritage will be gone. Optimistic buildings for an optimistic time - space-age living. This version of community living didn't quite work out, but once it's gone, who will remember it in 100 years time? The photographs that will be taken over the next two years may be more important than those who take them realise. Keep an eye on how it develops on Jack's blog.