Forest 2018 Artists & Installations Unveiled

12 Sep 2018

Forest of Imagination fosters a vision to support artists from myriad disciplines, enabling them to produce pieces of work commissioned for the Forest of Imagination and curated by co-founders Penny Hay and Andrew Grant.

Installations, immersive pieces, soundscapes and architectural designs that reflect the brief, which this year focuses on the importance of Regeneration, Green and Blue Infrastructure, Wildlife Corridors, all seen through the lens and idea of a Future Forest. Amid the intrinsic ethos of Forest of Imagination, that creativity, access to natural spaces, urban regeneration and imagination is a fundamental right that every child and adult should have access to whatever their background or belief.

In 2018 we have a range of leading artists working with us to produce unique installations for the Forest event. Here is an overview of the lead artists and the work they are proposing to showcase at Forest Imagination 2018.

Inflatable Forest and Floating Forest – Designed and Created by the Team at Grant Associates

The Inflatable Forest is a structure created to represent a giant future forest, a surreal, modernist vision of a wild urban Forest, based on the structure of the beautiful Baobab Trees in Madagascar – with its vast trunk and an opening to allow visitors to physically enter the tree, to touch its soft and tactile walls, branches and floors. The Tree is entirely accessible to allow wheelchairs to access the structure. During the Forest of Imagination – a variety of workshops will be held inside, including a dance workshop sponsored and produced by Three Ways School.

Forest Pyramids – Designed and Created by Charley Brentnall and architect Piers Taylor 

A series of large scale, iconic timber installations made from long forest thinning poles which will be up to 12m high. Each Pyramid will include coloured lanterns, with the intention that they are lit at night and hang down from the centre of the structures. Prepare to be awed as well-known TV architect Piers Taylor and

The Den and The Courtyard of Creativity – Created and Designed by the Team at FCB Studios and Built with help from Bath College and Bath University 

The Courtyard of Creativity is a proposal for populating Kingsmead Square with street furniture that will combine the activities of learning, creating, dreaming, eating, resting and simply watching the world go by. FCB Studios have introduced the idea of playfulness by turning the scale of the objects with reference to the size of the child and an adult or teenager. Each piece will be decorated with blackboard paint to encourage drawing and making directly onto the table. The paint will be designed like a riverbank to reflect the River Avon regeneration and animals found at the river will be included in the designs to encourage the link between the city and its natural habitats.

The Den provides a key concept of how to incorporate habitats and dens of flora and fauna ecosystems in an ever urbanising human population, allowing the nature to flourish in an urban realm. How do humans form dens of privacy, safety and comfort amongst the business of urban life? The Den is a space of calm amongst the intensity and vibrancy of urban living. This space has been created especially with the Bath Children’s Literature Festival in mind, which Forest of Imagination is aligning with this year. The Den provides a space for reading, writing, a library of books and a quiet space for thinking about words or simply surrounded by stories.

The Beauty of Children at Play – Martyn Ware and Illustrious and Tileyard Education MA Students 

A journey of sound linking Kingsmead Square to the River Avon, featuring a 3D soundscape beneath the canopy of the Kingsmead Square Tree. Created, designed and written by musician and sound artist Martyn Ware. Martyn has recently become Principle of Tileyard Education lecturing on the Commercial Music MA course. This year, Martyn offered his students the opportunity to take a part in composing and creating the SoundScape for Forest and we are thrilled to announce MA students Duncan Brookefield and ZoZo Mermaid will showcase their pieces: ‘The Sound of Water’ and ‘Waterdops’ alongside Martyn Ware and Gabriel Ware’s composition: ‘The Beauty of Children at Play’.

Shimmer – Alison Harper and Bath College Students 

Bath Artist Alison Harper returns once again to Forest of Imagination, this year Alison, whose breadth of diverse work is intrinsically linked to recycling and reuse, will be using left over coffee bags and crisp packets to create her installation. Her work will see a enhancement of the canopy of the large willow tree using a massive web of shimmering tendrils made from used coffee bean bags collected from the wealth of coffee shops scattered across the city of Bath. A den will also be co-designed with textile and art students from Bath College to provide shelter and experience the canopies of the trees is myriad connecting ways.

Bioluminescence – Shai Akram and The Egg Theatre

London Artist and current Artist in residence at The Egg Theatre, Shai Akram proposes a bold and unique installation for Forest of Imagination, a giant pool of bioluminescence. With plans to establish the pool at The Egg Theatre Shai’s installation will encourage visitors to touch the tactile the living organism and experience the undulating and breathtaking emission of light. This installation, although free to visitors at the Forest of Imagination, will be ticketed to ensure the delicate and living installation is not overwhelmed by numbers.

Museo Aero Solo – Tomas Saraceno Aerocene and Joanna Wright and The Public

Following the success of the launch of the Areocene during Forest of Imagination 2017, this year we are planning on launching the Museo Aero Solo – a flying museum and a solar sculpture made by the “Museo Aero Solar” group – an open-source international community, initiated more 8 years ago by Tomás Saraceno in conversation with Alberto Pesavento, inviting everybody to take part and to turn used plastic bags to lighter-than-air sculptures. We invite the public to bring unwanted plastic bags to a central point, while artist Joanna Wright, attaches each bag to create the Museo Aero Solo installation. Community help with this project and plastic bags are readily needed – so please get in touch if you would like to help or donate your bags.

Tree Drawing Machine – Matthew Leece and Ray Clarke and Paul Bynoth

Artists Matthew Leece, Ray Clarke and Paul Bynoth will build an interactive drawing system that aims to allow users to depict the canopy of a tree above, below and the surroundings of the tree. With large scale drawings produced by the users, the Interactive Are Drawing Machines will be unlike any robot seen before.

 

Forest Maze – Jessica Palmer and Liberty Wright

Inspired by Bath’s Beazer Maze at Pultney Weir, Paper Artist Jessica Palmer alongside Artist Liberty Wright will create a maze from reclaimed cardboard boxes and paper decorations, installed by the River Avon with access inside the maze into the central drawing space.