SENSIBILIA

Original submission

This submission is for support for an innovative project which will involve the Architects and the Lead Artist in exploring new ways of expressing and articulating the life and functions of a major public building. The project will involve all parties in evolving a set of mechanisms which will express the building and its life to those with some form of disability or impairment.

The Lead Artist for the project, Clive Gillman, has a background in the design of innovative computer –based interactive artworks. These works have strong content as well as formal and conceptual considerations and often have been developed for specific locations or users. Many works are game-like in their structure encouraging long-term and repeat engagement with detailed and complex interactive domains.

The project architects (Austin-Smith:Lord) have significant experience in the development of highly populated, technologically advanced environments with good access principles. ASL have also worked since April of this year with the Lead Artist on a number of design features for the building and through this process a good working relationship has been established.

This project is intended as an opportunity to focus these two partners in a project which will use an innovative approach to new media as vehicle for expressing a building to a very particular set of its users.

Using virtual explorable spaces (designed in conjunction with the 3D modelling team at ASL) the artist will work closely with a disabled consultant to consider how a building, packed with audio and visual stimulus can be made significant to those unable to access these stimulus directly. It is also hoped that this project will result in a work which non-disabled people will want to engage with – which will ensure equivalence in interpretation.

Funding is sought to support the artist in producing the template for the work, for the disability consultant and for the production of the 3D models required. The broader issues of public art within the building, access consultation and building planning are all funded separately as part of the overall FACT Centre project.

This project is seen as an opportunity to evolve an existing relationship through a tightly focused project which will have significant value, both for the building development in question, but also as an exemplar of broad access principles.

Methodology review

The Sensibilia project was designed to explore the ways in which a complex cultural building can use technology to ensure equality of access to information for those with some form of disability. The project aimed to test ways of interfacing with technology as well as the appropriate design and language of the information used. An initial approach to the project involved the use of Quicktime VR technology to construct visualisations of the building which would help guide disabled users around the building.

The project was carried out in conjunction with North West Disability Arts Forum and 4 specialist consultants. These were ;

Alison Jones Mickey Fellowes Damien O'Connor Tim Toner

The methodology involved a set of initial in-depth one to one meetings to learn about the concerns and issues of specific disabilities. This was followed by a number of site visits to various buildings to examine ways in which information is presented and, most notably, a series of unguided visits to technologically based art exhibitions in the Merseyside area. The outcome of this initial research informed a design stage, in which a pilot information structure was authored. This pilot was then presented to the group for testing and feedback. Some comments from the 4 consultants can be acessed by clicking on their names above.

The work on this project has been done in the context of the broader objectives of the Lead Artist interventions which are detailed in another section.