Artist: Richard Wilson
Title: Turning the Place Over
Date: June 07 – December 08
Place: Liverpool, Cross Keys House
Commissioners and Funders: Co-commissioned by the Liverpool Culture Company and Liverpool Biennial, co-funded by the Northwest Regional Development Agency and the Northern Way, and facilitated by Liverpool Vision.
Richard Wilson’s architectural intervention ‘Turning the Place Over’ is one of the key public art projects in Liverpool for the European Capital of Culture. Initiated out of Wilson’s ideas of architecture as event, this temporary work literally turns a building in Liverpool’s city centre inside out.
‘Turning the Place Over’ consists of an 8 metre diameter ovoid cut from the façade of a building in Liverpool city centre and made to oscillate in three dimensions. The revolving façade rests on a specially designed giant rotator, usually used in the shipping and nuclear industries, and acts as a huge opening and closing ‘window’, offering recurrent glimpses of the interior during its constant cycle during daylight hours.
The construction programme started in February 2007 and involved the careful deconstruction of the façade across three floors of the building, which was then reconstructed and fixed to the enormous pivot installed at the heart of the building. The work will be installed until the end of 2008.
This work communicates to audiences on many levels and platforms (62 videos are currently uploaded onto youtube). It is an astonishing feat of engineering. It sculpturally challenges our perceptions about the possibility of materials; one does not normally associate glass, brick, stone, or steel with movement. The work also makes reference to our constantly changing cityscapes.
The Wonderful North road trip took Bryan and Laura to Liverpool on Day 24.
The artists commented that:
“it is a fitting tribute that the combination of art and derelict space has been commissioned as an icon for the Capital of Culture celebrations”.
In their blog the artists refer to the work of Gordon Matta-Clark as an obvious source for ‘Turning the Place Over’. In 1975 Matta-Clark made ‘Conical Intersect‘ in empty houses earmarked for demolition by de Gaule as part of the regeneration scheme of Les Halles, Paris around the Pompidou Centre - a conical shape cut through houses that pierced the exterior wall at the widest point. http://www.ubu.com/film/gmc_conical.html.
‘Turning the Place Over’ is a piece of temporary public art. Consider both the positive and negative aspects of an area having a piece of temporary public art compared to a permanent structure. Take into account the artist, the community, impact, event, legacy, and cultural function.
Have this discussion as a debate? Think of a hypothetical site for a piece of public art.
Divide yourselves into two groups, one side arguing for a piece of temporary public art for your site while the other side argues for a piece of permanent public art.