Research Reflections: Home Futures

I’m an artist working with photography and sculpture. At the centre of my practice are the concepts of Home and Dwelling.

Earlier this year, Creativeworks London gave me the unique opportunity to do a residency in the school of Geography at Queen Mary University of London to explore notions of Home Futures in response to Dr Richard Baxter’s research project on the Aylesbury Estate, a high-rise estate in south London that was built by young modernist architects in a spirit of social utopia in the 60’s and 70’s. It was built quickly and fell in disrepair in the 1980’s. It is currently undergoing a major regeneration program, which has been well received by some of the residents and actively resisted by others.

The conceptual aspect of my practice was developed and strengthened through my discussions with Dr Baxter and other academics from QMUL as well as their recommended readings and my visits to the Aylesbury Estate. As a result I have become increasingly interested in home as a material and imaginative space and the nurturing and destructive processes through which homes are made and unmade. Another key moment of the residency was the realisation that modernist architects such as Gaudi and Le Corbusier were deeply influenced by apiculture and the beehive. During this process I decided to produce a metaphorical film featuring melting honeycomb to draw attention to the transformative nature of the estate.

Thanks to the support of Creativeworks London I was able to work with a professional editor for the first time. This in itself was an exciting outcome and will certainly have a profound effect on my practice.

The residency was also a chance to work collaboratively not only with Dr Richard Baxter and the academics from the Centre for Studies of Home but also with the curators from the Geffrye Museum in preparation for an exhibition exploring the biography of the Aylesbury Estate and the conceptual and practical aspects of an artist led participatory paper mache sculpture. Initially there was a little communication challenge between Dr Baxter and I as our approaches and languages differed, yet this soon became one the most enriching aspect of the residency as we learnt to listen to and embrace each other’s different perspectives. I appreciated Richard’s academic rigour and political integrity as well as his open-minded approach and enthusiasm for art.  I found the meetings with the Geffrye museum inspiring, yet challenging when health and safety or other practical restrictions were mentioned. As a result from these meetings Dr Richard Baxter and I applied for a large grant from the Centre of Public Engagement at QMUL to fund the exhibition and the making of the sculpture. We are delighted to announce that our application was successful and that our project can develop further.

We are now working towards an exhibition and symposium at the Geffrye Museum opening next April for which I will make a sculpture examining resident inhabitation during the regeneration. Involving artist-led community participation, the sculpture will be constructed from papier mâché bricks made by residents and museum visitors, such as school children involved in the museum’s outreach programme. These will be made through five workshops, two at the museum and three near to the Aylesbury Estate. Involving a performative dimension, the sculpture will then be built during the exhibition’s opening hours by the artist, residents and architects involved in the regeneration. This active engagement will help visitors to learn about the estate and encourage dialogue between the different groups involved. The meaning of the work will emerge through discussions with participants but the performance could connect to alternative ideas of community led building.

Nadege Meriau, Artist and Dr Richard Baxter, QMUL

Date: October 2015