After lunch at the always good Bom Bom Patisserie artist Russ Ralph and I walk up on to the Loughborough University campus initially following the Fruit Route pathway, along Bat Alley, pass the Barefoot Orchard and on down the hill to Shirley Pearce Square. Here we find four large shipping containers.

Second-year Fine Art students have turned the square into a pop-up exhibition space. They have created group works and installed them in the four shipping containers.

The students say:
“The overall theme of ‘Landed’ was born out of an initial idea that the containers reminded us of shipping and movement. Products and produce passing across seas, as well as migration; especially those fleeing for asylum to this country, across dangerous waters, to escape war. People arriving in an unknown place, trying to survive and live life. We decided to elaborate on this idea and make it more accessible and relatable to students, as well as allowing for an open interpretation of ‘being’.

We all follow a similar pattern to this even in our own lives, not knowing where the endpoint is, what or where are we aiming to arrive at, and how we travel and navigate through this fast-paced world. The expectations placed upon us, the connections and people that become involved and affect our lives.”

Russ and I visit each container and we are told, with a little promoting, something about the installed works by the student invigilator assigned to each container.

The containers are themed:

1: Unknown
2: Interaction
3: Journey
4: Expectation

I particularly liked ‘Unknown’ and ‘Interaction’.

Inside ‘Landed Unknown‘

Inside ‘Interaction’ we are invited to blow up a balloon, tie it and write something on it before throwing it into a space in the container behind a curtain screen.

Russ blows up two balloons with a hand pump and writes quotes from Get Carter on them. I blow up just one with my lungs. The taste of rubber on my lips. I write something not quite a haiku on it that I can’t now remember.

It’s good to see the work and the enthusiasm of the art students. We discuss with one of them the positioning of the containers. Here on the campus they feel slightly cocooned away from the town, and people of Loughborough. The student tells us that the position was decided by their tutors and that another time it would be good to find and occupy a space outside of the university campus. I tell them that there’s no need to wait because…

THE GALLERY OF THE STREET IS OPEN

a fresh faced student
tells me all about context
a spring gale blowing

Paul Conneally
March 15th 2019