Once, as long ago as June of 2015, the ArtSpace at St Katharine’s Precinct looked like this:
Six months later we were holding our very first maker’s market for the Christmas season, showcasing the work of our artists in residence:
We knew we wanted to bring life and creativity to the site. We also wanted to test how we might support local artists and learn how we might support for social entrepreneurship through the development of the precinct. This was all new to us, however, so we started conversations with Bow Arts, who create and manage low-cost studio space.
It was still many months of talking, working on the planning application, finalising what we wanted for the site and working out an agreement with Bow Arts before we began work to clear out this corner, level the land and make it ready for the 12 new artist studios to be created in containers — enough to create a sense of community while still having a good amount of studio space within the constraints of the land available.
This is how the containers arrived.
For the first few showings, it was still a rather muddy industrial space
But a little gravel really transformed the feel of it, and painting the trim in orange (our colour scheme arrived at through working with the wonderful Wired Canvas) made another huge difference.
With artist viewings taking place throughout this transformation
The studio interiors developed over time as well:
Imagine how they have been transformed by the artists within them into beautiful studio spaces — short bios and examples of their work can be found on the ArtSpace web page (Studio pictures by Daniel Leal-Olivas):
The new year will see ongoing discussions about the Art Space, and we are looking forward to seeing what we can develop there with our new community of artists. In addition to transforming the still rather bare courtyard connecting the studios, and the signage and personality of the studios themselves, we are looking forward to holding markets and workshops, so watch this space to find out what is upcoming!