Informed by research, conversations and engagement with local people, these six artworks explore Nuneaton’s innovative people, workplaces and personal landscapes that shape the industrial identity of my home town.
When I was asked to write a ‘project’ for a large scale Place Partnerships funding bid to bring art and culture to Nuneaton and Bedworth I knew immediately I would bring Transit Art to my home town. I wanted to create a series of artworks for articulated lorry trailers that react to the Borough’s catch phrase, “Building a Better Borough”. If it is about building aspirations and opportunities for people who live and work there, I wanted to find the positive things we have going for us already and to address the increasing pessimism I hear from local people. I wanted to look at the Borough through a lens of beauty, ambition, inventiveness and GRIT.
My drive for these artworks was to explore Nuneaton’s innovative industries and workforce in order to create a series of beautiful images that capture the working landscape in Nuneaton today.
These artworks tell the story of just a handful of those places and people in the town who are creating a better world for us to live in.
I began with research into ‘green warehouses’ and to connect with people and businesses who were passionate about making a positive impact on the future of our planet and people’s lives: the ones who are the driving force of future innovation, the ‘disrupters’, the embracers of failure who turn faults into positivity, the designers who consider holistic ownership and are emotionally connected to what they believe in, the waste carriers and inert tippers who have a deep connection to their role and its historical and future value.
This Transit Art journey to create the artwork for Convoy introduced me to Bioleaching, that uses bacteria to reuse the metal in our E-waste, understanding how urban mining and the circular economy works.
I discovered how converting green hydrogen cleanly into electricity can produce power to run HGV’s that emit only water. I returned once more to witness the heart warming work at Nuneaton’s most inspirational and socially aware factory and admired floating petals and reflections on rain drenched tarmac roads.
Convoy has been a fascinating and eye opening experience. I have been genuinely touched, inspired, educated and welcomed by everyone I have worked with on this project. From sharing the love and importance of studying an art foundation course and the earths geology, to being amongst those whose passion and moral belief for doing their ‘job’ overrides monetary value and fame. This journey reached to the edges of the A5 to come full circle. For one day only the lorries were parked in Nuneaton town centre for people to see them up close during Art in the Streets, before heading out onto the roads and motorways of the Uk and Europe as working vehicles.
