| Popis: |
In recent years, public art has evolved to take a central role in urban regeneration in public places and, more recently, has been integrated into city branding. Published research and selected reports revealed that public art frequently opens up sensitive issues like social acceptance, ownership and cultural relevance, and showed that a participation-based approach can be used to address these issues. The literature review confirmed the main issues and the need for a theoretical platform to support future practice. The researcher has been a professional practitioner in the field for many years and was aware of the gap between contemporary practice and academic underpinning, resulting in divergent practices with unpredictable outcomes. Key elements found in the secondary research and overlaid with the fieldwork experience of the researcher were combined to create an analytical tool to analyse 46 practical cases of public art and design. This revealed five invitation elements [triggers to induce participation] which were found to be connected to four participation elements [patterns of participation]. A first conceptual model was formulated to investigate the interactions and transformation processes between these invitation and participation elements. The model was further developed and its validity was tested through two distinctive action-based research projects in which the researcher played a leading role. The projects confirmed the validity of the transformation process in the model and emergent pragmatic value. Expert interviews confirmed the validity of the model and understanding of how it may become sustainable, resulting in a toolkit for implementation to engender debate in the academic and practitioner community. The final theoretical model offers new thinking for leading public art and design practitioners and related stakeholders, to achieve consistent add-value. |
