Wonder Wall

A new art installation has landed in Pool as part of Heartlands which captures the geological affects that mining has on the earth during the height of Cornish tin mining, when miners were hitting depths of over 1km.

Conceived by artist Walter Jack and involving a unique molding technique to create a fluid and voluptuous effect never seen before with concrete on this scale, 'Crushed Wall' will sit within the village of Pool in Cornwall. Rising to 3m high, the wall will act as a corner stone and defining art feature of Heartlands.

Applications now open for studio space

There are 15 studios at Heartlands which are located at the centre of the exciting development incorporating culture, history and play.

Studios are for the use of artists, makers and crafts people and with lots of natural light and views over the market square and World Heritage Site of Robinson's Shaft it certainly is an inspiring place to work.

For further information on how to apply for a studio, along with costs and floor plans visit the Business section of our website.

Seams and Veins art commission finds its home!

It was a wonderful moment to see the first of the seven art installations arriving on site.

David Mackie's 'Seams and Veins' commission comprises of twelve Cornish granite boulders inlaid with bronze symbols and motifs representing where the Cornish emigrated to around the world. The boulders are positioned around Heartlands' five Diaspora gardens of North America, South America, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.

Local poet Bob Devereux wrote an exclusive poem for Heartlands that has been etched on the granite, telling the story of miners who took their skills abroad.

The boulders are lifted in to position within the Diaspora Gardens.

Artist David, casts a watchful eye on his work as it is carefully positioned to follow the mineral lodes underground.

Emblems in bronze representing Cornish emigration to South America.

Bronze emblems in the Australian gardens.

Remembering Cornish traditions such as the Stargazy Pie originating from Mousehole.

Cornish travels to South Africa are remembered.

Bob Devereux's poem is etched in the Cornish granite.

David putting the finish touches to the boulders in the South African garden with Robinson's Shaft in the background.

Creative Conversations Film

In March we held a Creative Conversations event to celebrate and inspire new ways of thinking. It was also a chance for participants to comment and reflect on the previous creative work that has taken place and to exchange knowledge, ideas and experience to contribute towards the thinking of Heartlands future Creative Strategy.

Find out about the day by watching our film produced by mycornwall.tv on our You Tube Channel http://youtu.be/rehJV_T12g8

David's Diaspora Blog

You can now get a real insight in to the ideas behind David Mackie's art work that will feature in the Diaspora Gardens. David worked with schools and community groups to develop the patterns that represent Cornwall's Diaspora. The Diaspora Gardens at Heartlands will include 5 gardens of North America, South America, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand each the size of half a football pitch. The planting represents the areas of the world that the Cornish emigrated, and took their mining engineering skills with them to leave the Cornish Mining legacy all over the world.

David's artwork consists of imagery inspired by the countries the Cornish travelled to, these images will be cast in bronze a mix of tin and copper, and attached to granite boulders in the Diaspora gardens. Some examples of the imagery can be seen below. Take a look at David's blog which gives a real insight in how the project start and was inspired by people in the community. http://www.seamsandveins.tumblr.com/

Local poet teams up with artist to celebrate the Cornish Diaspora

Artist David Mackie who is working on the seams and veins public art commission in the Diaspora Gardens at Heartlands has teamed up with local poet Bob Devereux.

Bob has produced a poem that will be etched in to the granite boulders that David is using as part of his art commission. Bob's poem is below and relates to how the Cornish migrated and travelled all over the world taking their mining skills with them ready to teach others.

Wise in ways of water, steam and engine beams

Seeking ore sheathed in knowledge of bronze

Families determined to flourish

Severed from heartlands uprooted

Sailed to uncertain destinies

Offered free passage they prospered

Followed lodes around the globe

Skilled workers in the seams no dreamers

Spoke of Mexico in epic letters home

Shared kinship in deep shaft in Moonta

Made fortunes mining the rand gold reef

New life blooms from hard rock history

Creative Conversations

From the beginning Heartlands has been a community focused project with an emphasis on inclusive design. Considerable public consultation has been undertaken to ensure the needs and aspirations of the local community have been heard and incorporated into the design. Local schools have contributed very generously to the project in terms of time, talent and goodwill all of which will undoubtedly benefit Heartlands.

Creative Conversations was a one day event with the aim to describe the creative context for Heartlands and share the project's widely recognised socially inclusive co-creation work achieved over the past four and a half years.

Creative Conversation heard from local, national and international arts practises who have engaged directly with the Heartlands community, creating contexts for debate and animating the dialogue in challenging ways.

The themes for the event were:

Can art & culture tackle inequalities, create stronger communities and invite different people to the table?

Could and should, art & culture continue to make an active and forceful contribution to Heartlands in the future? What are/will be Heartlands core 'creative' activities?

Podcasts from Creative Conversations

Go to our podcasts page and listen to the days events at Creative Conversations to find out what went on.

Seams and Veins

Artist David Mackie is working on the art feature in the Diaspora Gardens at Heartlands. Working with local schools and community groups David has designed a series of symbols that will depict the Cornish Diaspora regions - New Zealand, Australia, South America, North America and South America. Each of these regions where the Cornish travelled will have its own garden at Heartlands with flowers and plants from these countries.

The Diaspora images and symbols will be reproduced in bronze and fixed on to granite boulders sourced from Delank quarry in Bodmin.

David is currently creating the patterns of the symbols in clay (as seen in the photo above which shows a Mexican coin) that will then be covered in rubber to produce a mould. The mould will be sent to a foundry who will cast the symbols in bronze.

Take a look at David's blog to see his patterns of just some of the symbols that will be fixed to the granite boulders.

Unique gateway size and scale revealed

Artist Walter Jack is working on a unique gateway in the form of a crushed wall, that will take visitors from Pool Village to the Heartlands site.

The crushed wall is inspired by Cornish geology and is a representation of crushed rock in liquid form.

The 24 metre long wall will be cast in concrete using the mould pictured in the above photo, this shows the exact scale and size of the wall.

Walter Jack worked with local concrete suppliers Ladds to develop innovative casting techniques that will create the waves in the concrete.

Above photo courtesy of Walter Jack

Bow-Wow's replica Gunpowder Store taking fine form

Architects and artists Atelier Bow-Wow are creating two gateways in to the Heartlands site which will take visitors from the main entrance or from Cornwall College.

Above are photos of the sample of the gateway from Cornwall College that will be a spiral walled structure and will be symmetrically positioned next to the existing Gunpowder Store, producing a Gateway by walking between the new and replica Gunpowder Stores.

The yellow line in the photo below shows where the new structure will sit opposite the existing Gunpowder Store.

Crushed Wall sample unveiled!

Artist Walter Jack is working on the art commission that will lead visitors in to Heartlands from Pool Village in to the main site.

The 24 metre long Crushed Wall will be 2.8 metres at its highest point and 1 metre at its lowest. Walter's Crushed Wall is inspired by Cornish geology, a sample can be seen in the above photograph. Local concrete works Ladds, are involved as the wall will be cast in concrete. A rubber mould will be used to cast the wall, which will create the crumples and wavy effect of the structure.

The Heartlands Totem Poles have got their very own blog!

The Plan an Gwarry totem poles, will form the circular boundary of the events space, which will have the capacity to hold 150 people to watch performances or use as an outdoor classroom.

Artist Nicky Neate worked with Pool Business and Enterprise College students on the totem project. Nicky documents the process of turning the salvaged timber in to works of art on her blog.

Opening Doors tell us about their visit to Heartlands

Today we had a different meeting. We went to the Heartlands Project in Pool to see what was happening there. We need a new place to meet so we are looking at all the different places we could use. We hope to use some rooms at the Heartlands Project.

The Heartlands project is all about using land that was not being used and changing it to land that can be enjoyed by lots of people. They will take some of the old buildings and make them better. They will build new buildings. It will look great when it is done.

They will have nice gardens for people to relax in. They will have a pond and water feature that people will enjoy. There will be a museum for people to learn about the history of all the work in the tin mining industry. There will be a theatre for performances. There will be artist's studios. There will be an open air theatre for music and performances.

Kirsty showed us on the model what it would look like.

This is some of the land that is not being used at the moment. It used to look a mess.

This will be the cafe. It needs lots of work doing to it.

This is the Robinson's Shaft where the museum will be.

This is where they will build the artists studios. It was flat and nothing there. It was hard to imagine what it would look like. They will have markets and a children's centre.

There is a web cam which will show how they are getting on. You can see it on the Internet at the Heartlands website. Have a look at http://www.heartlandscornwall.com/

Here they are building a new road so that you can get to Heartland easily. You can get a bus there. David knew lots about mining and all the big machines they were using. He told us what they were and what they did. David told us all about his family who worked at Falmouth Docks and the Holman works.

We finished off our tour by having our picture taken with Sarah, Kirsty and Claire. Gary and Judith looked cool in their sunglasses. It was a great day for a visit.

Sheila has done lots of art work which helped to the money for the Heartlands project. Gary said he was pleased he had found out more about the Heartlands project. Tina thanked everyone for the interesting visit. Persida said its going to be awesome when its finished. We were all excited about the project and what it would look like.

Kirsty and Sarah said they were happy that we had come to see the project. They said to keep in touch. They would like to do other things with us. Things like fireworks on bonfire night and Christmas. We then had lunch with Kirsty, Sarah and Claire.

Words and photos kindly created by Peter Keeves, Cornwall Partnership Trust.

Totems finished!

Over the last 2 years artist Nicky Neate, has been involved in this community led art piece with a task of inscribing a message, poem or sentiment to the recycled totem beams that will surround the concave circle of the Plan an Gwarry, that will be located in the Market Square at Heartlands.

Through a series of interactive workshops with students from Pool Business and Enterprise College, year 9 students created their own graphics for an alphabet. This alphabet is unique to the location and site of Robinson's Shaft at Heartlands; the group picked letters from the alphabet and the students were then given the task of designing their own letter, using and being inspired by the discarded metal objects that were collected from the mine site.

The year 9 students then produced a poem using their alphabet which has been cut out of copper and steel plates and fixed on to the totem beams by Nicky.

University of the 3rd Age explore their 'lost words'

Artist David Mackie, is working on the Diaspora Seams and Veins commission at Heartlands. The Seams and Veins are integrated artworks set within the Diaspora Gardens. It is anticipated that by listening and working with the local and Cornish Diaspora community significant cultural objects, texts and words will be captured and inlaid within the Cornish stonework.

David has worked with Pool Business and Enterprise College, Camborne Science and Community College, Redruth Technology College, St Johns Primary School, Cornwall College, and the University of the 3rd Age, to gather the communities thoughts on identity and belonging.

During a session with the University of the 3rd Age art group, David along with book maker Becky Adams, explored ways to incorporate Cornish "lost words" and poetry in to the Diaspora Gardens using techniques such as making stamps and imprinting letters on copper and tin. The letter designs will be incorporated in to a design for a postcard which will be sent to Cornish Diaspora Societies throughout the world requesting their "lost words".

Students take their Lost Words to the beach

The hugely successful Lost Words Found Objects arts project, which has been a partnership between Heartlands, artist Ben Cook and students from Pool Business and Enterprise College, is coming to a finale.

Lost Words Found Objects is a project looking at the Cornish language and exploring forgotten words in the Cornish vocabulary. Find out what happened when year 8 students from Pool School took their Lost Words to Gwithian Beach, at their blog here.

Mine is Yours

Heartlands has teamed up with local artist Laura Smith and Aune Head Arts to work on the Mine is Yours project. Laura Smith worked with the local community surrounding Heartlands to research stories from the area and also looking at the mining history in Pool.

Pool Business and Enterprise College students recorded the stories that were collected from local people, miners and their families. Laura's work with Heartlands has been documented on the following website:
Mine is Yours

Cornwall College students help capture Heartlands in pictures

Every stage of Heartlands' development is being documented on camera by students from Cornwall College, Camborne.

The photography students will be making regular visits to the site to document each stage in the £35million project. Before work officially gets underway, the students have been busy capturing the site, documenting and archiving the historic buildings before the site is cleared and prepared in preparation for building work in the summer this year.

The pictures will be an inspirational resource not only for artists and designers working at Heartlands, but also for the community, including educational and community organisations. Heartlands social archive has been created to raise awareness about Cornwall's cultural heritage, as well as recognising and celebrating its achievements and aims to offer insight through learning from the material culture of this historic World Heritage Gateway.

The Cornwall College students that are photographing the site are studying for the Foundation degree in Animation and Foundation degree in Multimedia Design. Stephen Howard, Head of Multi Media and Animation at Cornwall College said "We are delighted to be able to work with Heartlands, the students are enjoying being involved in an exciting live project right on their door step and gaining valuable work experience too".

Lost Words Found Objects Blog

Heartlands have been working with Pool Business and Enterprise College and artist Ben Cook on the Lost Words Found Objects project. Click here to keep up to date with all the Lost Words Found Objects news.