ArtMarkers

The Cradley ArtMarkers project

As of 2022 the glass panels are decorating Cradley & Storridge village halls, the surgery and the school.

March 2006

The Village Artmarkers exhibition in Cradley Church attracted a number of useful comments; these, and others, were discussed at the meeting in Cradley Village Hall on Saturday 4th March.

The different options for locating the artwork were warmly debated and then put to the vote. The result was a decision to locate the glass artwork in several places around the village, within publicly accessible buildings. Seven locations had been nominated and these were voted on to select four window pieces which could be constructed within the budget of the project.

The preferred locations were: Cradley Village Hall; Storridge Village Hall; Cradley Post Office Shop; and Cradley Primary School, with the Doctor’s Surgery waiting room, the Church and the Heritage Room in Cradley Village Hall as runners up.

The next stage of the project was to investigate further the feasibility of placing glass pieces in these locations and to make a final selection accordingly. Designs were then drawn up and reviewed by Herefordshire County Council and the Parish Council before the glass was made and installed.

Exhibition

The Village Artmarkers exhibition in Cradley Church daily from Saturday 25 Feb to Friday 3rd March was followed by a meeting in Cradley Village Hall on Saturday 4th March at 2.30pm (tea & coffee & chat) for 3pm to decide on the design of art work for Cradley.

Received 28 Feb from Jackie Hunt; the drawings show options based on discussions so far but any combination of ideas is possible so long as it works and can be done within the budget! The main thing was for Cradley to choose. The project was scheduled to be completed in the summer.

Aims

Village Artmarkers aims to increase opportunities for people in rural areas to experience and participate in the arts, learn more about their heritage and finally for the resulting public artwork to provide a community focus.

Getting involved in the project offers people of all ages and abilities in eight Herefordshire villages the chance to explore their heritage through workshops and artist led creative activity. It also gives participants the chance to have their say about what they want their piece of artwork to be inspired by e.g. local stories, traditions, and architecture. An accompanying leaflet which is available to everyone called Heritage All Around Us offers people more information to learn how to take the exploration of their heritage further, including how and where to look.

A heritage adviser and an artist lead the workshops. The heritage adviser leads the exploration and discussion of local heritage, through sharing memories, local stories, photographs and anything written about the land, people and architecture, from ancient to modern. The artist facilitates the interpretation of people's feelings and ideas about their heritage via creative activity. The artists in each village will take the most important aspects of each parish heritage, as fed in by people in the workshops.

The artist will then produce a final design that takes into account which aspects of the community's heritage matter most to them. The final work produced could be temporary in nature or form a unique, permanent and durable public artwork within the village.

Village Artmarkers has been initiated and managed by Cultural Services of Herefordshire Council with funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund and Arts Council England, West Midlands and a contribution from each participating Parish Council.