G&W: FUTUREPROOF (NWSP)

Collective Gallery (Guest Room), Edinburgh, 2009 -in association with PLACE Projects

Brought together by the PLACE Projects, Katherine Gallacher and Ric Warren present FUTUREPROOF: an exhibition featuring selected outcomes of a collaborative research project exploring current trends in the revitalisation of urban landscapes. The installation explores various strategies to re-think Edinburgh's historic urban skyline in order to synchronise the city with the new millennium.

Futureproof (Ambition, Modernity & Novelty), 2009 - Detail

Inspired by homogenous approaches to contemporary town planning that employs a process of building glimmering façades of ‘progress’, we created this tongue-in-cheek proposal for a futuristic cityscape. Concerned with the lack of longevity of such regeneration projects we used aluminium foil to create our crudely produced vision of the future. Aluminum foil has an initial aesthetic deception of a resilient glimmering precious metal contrasted with its actual properties as a cheap, flimsy and ephemeral material. This ‘town planner’s table’ attempts to blur the distinction between sculpture and architectural proposal.

Modes of Regeneration, 2009

These glittering models are loosely based on architectural features of Glasgow’s regenerated river Clyde, but are intentionally not direct copies. Instead, they are intended to cross-reference a fashionable vernacular of architecture that is played out across many post-industrial cities. This work is intended to highlight to the homogeny of contemporary urban planning that tends to use tried and tested formulas of urban reform that involve such conscious in-your-face symbols of futurity that can be considered as glittering façades of ‘progress’.

Left to Right: Futureproof (Ambition, Modernity & Novelty) / Cycles of Transformation / Modes of Regeneration, 2009

Installation View

Strategies of Futurity, 2009 &

Re-encoding the Skyline, 2009

"...the image of the city can arise from changes in perception, as well as from physical alterations. The skyline of a city traces the visual signature of its identity. It offers an immediate reading of its ambition, modernity and novelty through which economic, social and aesthetic meanings are signified. Accordingly, urban imaginaries are constituted by visual narratives – summary readings of history and futurity encoded in the skyline, both as its is and how it might be.”

David Parker & Paul Long : ‘The Mistakes of the Past? Visual Narratives of Urban Decline and Regeneration’