Public Art

Land Securities has a distinguished record of supporting the arts as an integral part of their development projects. In recent years, the commitment to commissioning public art as part of their new developments, retail and commercial, has been a priority. Commissioning high quality site-specific artwork creates a unique development, adds to the sense of place and gives an extra level of quality and detail to the built environment.

InSite Arts (visual arts consultants), was commissioned by Land Securities to develop a public art programme specifically for Princesshay. This was developed through extensive consultation with the design team, Land Securities and its partner, Exeter City Council. As a result the public art has formed an important part of the Princesshay development.

Marking Time’ by Patricia MacKinnon-Day

As part of a major programme of public art in and around Princesshay, Patricia MacKinnon-Day was commissioned to create a permanent installation on the site of the historically important Almshouses in Catherine Street. Constructed in 1450, the Almshouses recently underwent structural repair and enhancements following an initiative by Land Securities, Exeter City Council and English Heritage to create an improved setting for one of Exeter’s most historic landmarks.

The work created by Patricia MacKinnon-Day, entitled ‘Marking Time’, provides an explanation of the history of the buildings and consists of the recreation of the lost doors that would have originally been part of the Almshouses. These take the form of freestanding arched doors made of glass, sited in the precise location that the doors would have once been. Copied from the medieval designs of the Almhouses, these doors are illuminated to showcase archaeological finds from the site encased within the glass. Other elements of the installation include rows of still and flickering votive lights filling the chapel space, with texts from the historic Chapter Acts books, describing the lives of mediaeval occupants, etched into the paving.  

‘The Exeter Traceries’ by Katayoun Pasban Dowlatshahi

 At the heart of the development is a new public square, designed as a continental-style piazza featuring cafés and restaurants. Princesshay Square has become a new focus for eating and dining in the city. A glass pavilion, which houses Strada and Exe Shed, forms the centrepiece of the square, and is also the site of one of the developments most exciting pieces of public art. Six glass panels, each measuring 4137mm by 1748mm, have been installed on the façade of the pavilion featuring the work of Iranian-born British artist Katayoun Pasban Dowlatshahi.

Inspired by the sacred architecture of Exeter Cathedral, and its close proximity behind the square, the artist has created a series of ‘windows’, which echo the notion of a medieval rood screen. In the same way that Cathedral windows are intended as apertures to heavenly bodies as well as being focal points for personnel contemplation, the six glass panels bring to a secular space, the purity of contemplation while at the same time emphasizing the ephemeral nature of light.

The Cathedral is a living monument and the glass pavilion is, by association, a rood screen obscuring and simultaneously revealing this scared space. The designs appearing on each glass panel, applied through a process of hot enamelling and silk screening, also carry references to the city’s network of medieval subterranean aqueducts. 

Roger Dean – Memorial Sculpture 

This new work by Exeter based sculptor Roger Dean, incorporates a wall of curved stainless steel with two highly detailed bronze reliefs.

The front relief, within the concave of the sculpture, was originally created for a memorial fountain located in the city centre. As the new development evolved, it was apparent that the fountain needed to be removed. Taking this as an opportunity, Land Securities invited Roger to revisit his work and make a contemporary response to his original theme, the impact of the 1942 Blitz on Exeter.

The new sculptural work is located within Broadwalk House Gardens in Southernhay. Two reliefs have been created from photographic records of the city the day after the bombardment. These are encapsulated in a sculptural wall that creates a new focal point in the gardens , offering busy users of the city a place for a moment’s respite and contemplation.

‘Glow Stones’ by Jeff Bell

Jeff Bell’s collection of glass ‘pebble seats’ create an irresistible series of resting places in Princesshay Square. Inspired by the texture of Exeter’s weather beaten historic city walls, these tactile ribbed glass structures, made up of planes of stacked glass, are positioned in what appears to be random points in the square. Their placement has been carefully guided to ‘reveal’ the new sightlines through this public meeting place and, in particular, to direct the view towards the spectacular vista of Exeter’s Cathedral.

The creation of the sculptures that play and interact with light and space is a direct response to these two most basic human needs. The reflective quality of glass brings objects to life and one of the most exhilarating elements is its unpredictable nature.

By daylight these playful structures resonate with the reflective and refractive qualities of glass. By night they assume a gem-like quality. Special lighting, integrated into the structure, gradually and gently illuminates these fairy-tale objects with a rainbow sequence of colour.

‘River Walk’ by Patrick Shanahan

The temporary photographic commission was awarded to regionally based artist-photographer Patrick Shanahan, whose well established international reputation lead to an extraordinary series of works, exhibited around Exeter and the development site. Patrick chose to investigate the contemporary ‘cultural landscape’ and capture moments of Exeter perhaps long taken for granted or no longer easily accessible.

Patrick’s commission for the Paris Street hoardings, ‘River Walk’, was based around a series of walks along the River Exe, from Exeter’s Quayside to Exmouth in the east and Dawlish, west of the city.

“The images displayed in Paris Street are not chronologically ordered, they are sequenced to convey the experience of walking though the landscape unconsciously taking in the views in a haphazard way, as your eyes wander from the general view to a detailed view” Comments Patrick

The photo works taken for both ‘ancient + modern’ commissions revealed a juxtaposition of a modern developing city with the old and historic rich foundations of Exeter.

Patrick’s exquisite photographs convert otherwise recognisable urban landscapes into reworked places that have both a strong evocative capacity and sense of artificiality about them. In blurring the distinction between reality and imagination, Shanahan’s photographs manage to alter the way we see and relate to the world.