Dylan Thomas mural unveiled in Swansea

A major new work by Welsh artist Pete Fowler (who has in the past created artwork for album covers for the band Super Furry Animals) has recently been unveiled opposite Swansea railway station as part of Art Across the High Street, a scheme to improve the appearance of the city centre by commissioning artworks for disused or run down retail units. The artwork is on the site of a former nightclub.

The work was inspired by local icon, poet Dylan Thomas  (for which the centenary will be celebrated in 2014) and work created by local schoolchildren in workshops. The mural measures 9m x 6m and has Dylan as its centrepiece, complemented by Fowler’s unique take on Swansea including it’s maritime and mining heritage, Viking history, UFO sightings alongside two giant horses and a pair of pink octopus. 

The project is funded by the Welsh Government, City & County of Swansea and Swansea BID and delivered in partnership with LOCWS International. 

This work is looking phenomenal on the high street, I'd love to see a picture of the building beforehand, and I wonder what the response has been like locally?

To find out more about the project, visit: http://www.locwsinternational.com/?p=6210 

Richard Deacon commission forms part of Piccadilly development in London

The Eagle Place development at St James's (showing the artwork in red)

A new glazed terracotta cornice by sculptor Richard Deacon (b.1949) will soon be revealed on the facade of a major new development in Piccadilly, London. 

Deacon, who won the Turner Prize in 1987, was commissioned to work with Eric Parry Architects (who were responsible for the recent lauded extension to the Holburne Museum in Bath) on the work for Eagle House on the St James's Gateway scheme.

The artwork is 25 metres long and consists of 39 glazed terracotta pieces.

Map of faience facade elements

According to Will Mclean in an article on the Architectural Review website, 
'As a sculptor acquainted with the deft manipulation of matter, Deacon studied and has remade the cornice as a ‘chopped up’ performance of 14 variable prismatic forms, each mutated from a single genotypic cross-section, but confined in height, or what Parry described as ‘the field of play’ to a not inconsiderable 1200mm. In addition, each of these 39 sculptures, extending over 25m, is highly coloured with facsimiles of Deacon’s painting using screen-printed waterslide transfers (decals) in a process originally invented for the pottery industry; each facet of the cornice blocks is differently coloured, further emphasising the geometric transformations.'

The artist checks the waterslide transfers

The artwork is due to be unveiled in March 2013. Look forward to seeing it.

You can read the article (which focuses on the technical side of working with terracotta) here:
http://www.architectural-review.com/recasting-terracotta/8630667.article

There is an article about the project on the Evening Standard website here:
http://www.standard.co.uk/business/business-news/st-jamess-soon-to-reveal-its-new-deacon-8496801.html