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Based in Ireland, the group supports, promotes and advocates for rural based art projects and events which engage with local communities of place or communities of interest.
About
Ground Up began an experimental programme of contemporary art in rural contexts in Co. Clare, curated by Fiona Woods, the Regional Arts Coordinator for North Clare at the time, and funded by the Clare County Council Arts Office and the Arts Council. It involved 22 artists over three strands between 2003- 2007, staged a series of public events, generated two publications and 11 temporary public artworks. It had a strong artist-led ethos and laid emphasis on research; art in public was understood as both a process of research and a mode of dialoguing between artists, rural communities and the wider cultural discourse. The focus on temporary public art was very deliberate, a way of opening up spaces which could then close over again, emphasizing becoming over being, proposing performative rather than fixed identities for artists and audiences in rural places.
The aims of the project as stated at the outset were:
To facilitate a new type of engagement between public art practice and rural contexts, generating debate and discussion amongst practitioners and the rural constituency that will inform the engagement and the resulting artworks.
To create opportunities for artists to make interesting, challenging artworks where they live, independent of the gallery system.
To create opportunities for contemporary artists in rural areas to overcome their professional isolation, inspire and inform one another, interact with national/ international practitioners and address the need to acquire new skills.
To research ways in which contemporary art can be relevant and accessible to rural audiences without compromising the art.
In the first two strands (2003 – 2005) invited artists were paid to engage in a relatively short, collective research process, which had an inbuilt training and/or mentoring budget that the artists could spend as they chose. The team-based research process was seen as a way of examining received values about rural contexts and culture, and of building networks amongst geographically dispersed artists. Some artists were subsequently commissioned to carry out temporary public works, which themselves involved research stages of various lengths, some quite extensive.
The third strand (2006) brought an international dimension with 5 Irish and international artists participating in the programme, assisted by a number of local artists, promoting an exchange of knowledge and information between the two. This strand, titled Rural Vernacular drew an international audience through the conference and on-site symposium Shifting Ground; New Perspectives on Art and Rural Culture 2006.
A publication that both documents and extends the researches of Ground Up was published in 2008, titled Ground Up; Reconsidering Contemporary Art Practice in the Rural Context, ed. Fiona Woods.
Support
Grounds Up Artist Collective would like to recognise the generous support, both past and present, of the Clare County Council Arts Office and the Arts Council.