Mute Meadow goes ‘live’

CAN you hear the colours? The largest public art work ever commissioned on the island of Ireland was officially unveiled on Saturday and features sounds submitted by Londonderry folks turned into light at the dazzling riverside Mute Meadow in Ebrington.
By The Newsroom
Published 30th Jun 2011, 10:18 BST

Phase one of Mute Meadow, a seminal new artwork located on the banks of the River Foyle in Londonderry, was unveiled as part of the city’s Peace Bridge extravaganza at the weekend.

London-based artists Vong Phaophanit and Claire Oboussier created the artwork which celebrates the regeneration of Londonderry, marking its transformation from a city of conflict to a city of culture.

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Mute Meadow is unlike any other artwork in Ireland, in both design and scale. Stretching out across the waterfront, the £800,000 sculpture is the largest public artwork in Ireland and is made up of 40 pairs of angled steel columns lit at the base to resemble a shimmering ‘forest of light.’

Aideen McGinley, ILEX Chief Executive, believes Mute Meadow heralds a bright future for the Ebrington site.

She said: “Ebrington will be a wonderful new shared space for the people of Derry~Londonderry and Mute Meadow is a fitting signifier; a dynamic project of the highest quality with the people of the city at the heart of it.”

While it will be another few months before the Mute Meadow site is landscaped and fully accessible to the public, Saturday’s official ‘switch on’ marked an important milestone in the development of the unique public art project.

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A specially designed lighting programme was created as part of the project which converts sound data collected by the community into gently animated projections of coloured light, illuminating the columns at night.

Vong Phaophanit explained: “Over recent months we’ve been asking local people to upload their sounds of the city to the One Day I Planted a Seed website, created by the young people involved in the community engagement program.”

Claire Oboussier added: “As Mute Meadow reaches the final stages of construction it is genuinely exciting to see how art in public space can have the power to transform the visual landscape of a city such as Derry and play a role in the re-imagining of place.”

Mayor Alderman Maurice Devenney said: “The Mute Meadow artwork will complement the city’s existing art and cultural offering and provide the people of the city with a unique visual display alongside the Peace Bridge.

“The artwork reflects positively how the city is moving forward to celebrate its culture and heritage in preparation for UK City of Culture 2013.”

Related topics:Ireland