August 9th

Travelling tonight from Reus to Glasgow. Just carrying a small backpack with the cameras and some books.Hoping to land on time for the last train Prestwick-Glasgow although a night bus ride around can be quite amusing.More later.

August 10th

I’m in Glasgow . Weather is sunny and showery. I’m just settling in. I’d been going around and I noticed lot of new developments, some of my personal city landmarks dissapeared, Glasgow Harbour buildings are taking the riverside…not sure I like it and I’m aware how much issues in common our cities have.

Tomorrow at Drumchapel Arts workshop we’ll be deciding what and how to go ahead in the next days. I started to talk today with some collaborators and we see the need to meet together in some open debate event…Annie Flint is offering her displays and gazebo to use around (specially to avoid possible rain)…

Right now I found the Core paths plan from the city council …I copied Drumchapel paths link in a dedicated section of this blog. Is an interesting document that can be used to compare with the personals paths of the residents.

Feeling like at home…building sites, flats to sell, to rent…

August 11th

Just spent the day at Drum , we’d been planning work, contacting different people. Jep is helping me the first 3 days wandering around taking some  general pics and following the neighbourhood boundaries. After that I’ll walk with different companions. There wil be a workshop for young adults and a dialogue with retired local residents. Yvonne Taylor, David , Maureen and other neighbours involved in Drumchapel Arts Workshop will be collaborating during all activities. With Mary Malcomson we’ll be organizing some short happenings and corner chats inviting some guests to join the main subjects on debate ( Ann Flint loaned us a gazebo for the rain). There’s lot of ideas to share and people wanting to collaborate in the making of the map. Some good weather is expected so maybe the idea to organize an picnic can go ahead.

In our first walk we had been noticing some interested sites. Some vacant sites result of the dereliction of old council housing, roads going nowhere used to dump rubish or to walk the dog, empty streets with no signal of activity…

We find lot of kids playing around the vacant sites, they asked about the camera, I let them to take it and one of them took a nice pic of myself ( it could be interesting to know how they regard vacant land ). We met Jill, a nice woman originally from Manchester who pointed me to the nice flowers growing everywhere and to an open space where she enjoys the wonderful Glasgow sunsets…these will be the first landmarks in the map. Curiously the viewpoint looking at the sunset is where other people takes their dogs to walk, or other use as dump. Maybe we can landmark there some area in to highlight the beauty of it .

At the end of the walk we entered in the local pub The Butty where we had a good chat with the ladyowner and she introduced us to a very good malt.

august 12th

An interesting day. I discovered how difficult is to find a map of Drumchapel…tomorrow I’ll go to Mitchell Library to find out if they can give me a copy. I’d been doing quite a research on the area and Maureen, David and I had been talking of issues related with subjects as public space, community…I’ll be writing about the questions and themes appeared and working in the glossary.

All day has been raining heavely so we decided go up and down inside the tall flats…we couldn’t see any view from the top as the windows are covered with timber but I took  images through some of the windows that still have glass.

13th august

Good weather!!! We had been around the main part of the district and we went up the water tower.  From the tower you can appreciatte the fantastic view: open space, green grass, nature embedded in the city …also completely abandonned, neglected and forgotten places. I’d been speaking with some neighbours …they blame the vandals for some of the neglection but the incorrect policies and developments for the main part of it. They recognise vandalising is due as there’s nothing much around for young people.

In the water tower you feel in peace. Nice environment, astonishing views…but at the same time a very lonely place, in fact all that part of the district it looks empty, although looking closely the reality is completely different.

David, Maureen and I keep talking about some subjects so it will be quite useful build a conceptual map where to fit all the ideas we have related with the built of community, social space, relational space, territory…

I have not find a decent map yet and I need it to work in some take away papers to leave around.

13th august in a wire

The shoes hanging although can be an example of some kids naughtiness or even a stunt of some public relations company worldwide are know as part of the street secret codes with variations going from the mark of a gang territory to a drug dealing passing for a memorial. In different combinations also can include a codes for sex or weaponery. This is the only example we encountered, while doing the photograph we’ve got some shoutings and a group of youngster started to follow us…we just changed our direction to avoid any conflict.

Here there’s no graffitti so no much information about young residents urban culture. Just some tagging which probably designate some area of teen groups.

14th August

Some notes of the day:

Drumchapel area looks as it is in a continuous proccess. Few landmarks are left  and attempts to highlight some features had been refused by funding authorities.

I needed to go to Edinburgh to ask some info to the Scottish Arts Council. We walk the city for a while to find it was the start of theTattoo Fest. High Street was a big stage and the tourist were zombieing up and down looking for some luck. With all it has been a nice day and gave me the oportunity to read some of the documents about Drumchapel I’d been pulling out here and there. Still not map. Computer fused away yesterday so don’t know what is going to happen tomorrow.

Some degree of complain…

And a bit of love…

15th August

Done a guided tour with Maureen. We went to BlueBell woods, around what is left of old tennentments, to the new schools, the community centre…We had been talking with people involved in dinamizing the area.

Walking around with someone who knows so well the area is really illustrative…we talk about how some woods where planted by the kids, about children fishing tours, about how the people express their private life in the public sphere, about the neighbours winter festival or about Illuminate Drumchapel , a very good project to give some highlights to the district.

I had finally a decent map although not current.

Water tower viewpoint areas

16th August

Just writing and organising tomorrow’s sunday fishing itinerary. I worked in the map…some landmarks appeared: the woods, the view points, climbing areas…

17th August

We had been reproducing children fishing itineraries.

18th August

There are few benches around the area although there’s plenty space and fantastic views, a need of relational spaces and a loss in space for community network. There’s no much litter bins or fountains either… The lack of urban furniture is due to the fear of people vandalising this features.

And yes, some are abused some not…but this is not a reason to punish all neighbours. What about development areas? some are quickly regenerated after the dereliction regardless are built or not and other are left to degrade completely for some unknown reason but as far as I know not a development company has been punished for not taking care of the land while awaiting to build.

It’s a complex issue. And another reality is that the few furniture on the street is sometime useless, out of usual routes and looking at nowhere.

18th August URBAN LEGEND

I remember past year a street bench which I thought was in a very bizarre location : near the new park looking at the opposite side and with two paved paths to reach it…like it was a priviledged bench, highlighted in the landscape. This year the bench has been burned. Nobody was happy with it. This particular bench it was sitting in a 45.000 pounds of concrete. It says the legend this concrete  magnificent square and the two paths were built to accommodate a youth shelter but once the work was near finished whoever in charge considered the possible users of the shelter could bother the users of the Sports Centre located two hundred metres down the main path..I’m not sure how as the centre it have the main entrance in another area, is surrounded by a high fence, and as far I can recall I never seen any user. That’s the legend and this is the concrete square:

19th August

NOT AN URBAN LEGEND

It is a fact, not much people likes this winged horse, either the price paid for it. With all my respect for the artistic practice of the author, not sure this was a good idea. We all have in our cities ( probably Barcelona is on top of the list) who thinks still that public art is a matter or decorating the surroundigs with artifacts in some cases made with dubitous taste or with no relation whatsoever with the environment. The concept of public art has evolved in the past years becoming a controversial term so it could be good for some authorities to update their knowledge.

We are all aware how difficult is the funding for the arts. While some countries proved the capability to build networks, to facilitate resources to develop projects, to create funding schemes,  to open participative processes, to educate and promote social change through the arts just using their 1%, other like mine use the art budget to restore the heritage what although is not a bad thing  it is once this turns in lack of funding, resources, network for current arts.  So, regarding  the economic scale of  artifacts like the one below we can no less than think who is profiting of such and investment? not to blame anybody but sure there’s better things to do with near 30.000£.

Some concepts related with art in public realm: activation, participation, interaction, transformation, visualization, comprehension, social context, community, open process, experience,  dialogue…

About the Garscadden tombstone…sorry, no comment, no irony … someone called that a work of art and I’m speechless, maybe in another context and circumstances but not this one…just a monolith to spend common resources…an image is better than thousand words

20th August

We’d been doing work in the maps, organizing thursday walk, friday activities…tons of rain, no point on going out to record the gulls today… did I talked about that? well, as in a horror movie,  a frantic flock of gulls compite every midday in the tall flats path for the food the kids throw in the floor. Worth to see. Worth to give a thought about.

Peripheractions is a project which I’m going to be developing through different countries but in similar districts and environments.

The current work in Drumchapel it will be continuing as an open project an under the title PERIPHERACTIONS:G15. We are designing some G15 postcards and posters. Different people is involved and giving ideas. The first series of postcards will be presented in november. The experience map made with opinions of residents will be ready for that dates too.

21th August

Mireia has come from Spain to share some of the work, Gary Malcolmson joined us…I’d been talking with Mark Langdon and Chris Biddlecome  ( from the council and new city vision ) about the project and they are kin to participate in some future action.

Gary guided a walk around , we talked with some young people at G15 youth and also we spoke with Allen from the community centre. We hope Gary will be the link with young people as we thought it will be interesting once a month to gather at G15 youth centre interested parties participating in the map and in some photo walks.

Gary and Mireia pics  will be the first archive we send to Stephan at Signs of the city project in Berlin.

Allen from the community centre is quite interested in the idea of a cooking night at his venue . We think it will be a good day to do a debate and presentation session.

Some pics of the day.

22th August

The pictures say it all. We planted a gazebo in the park ( you will see soon a video of it) and we had a beautiful day outside talking to people about the district, learning, drinking tea…

oh!! yes, that last photo is me monkeying around

23th August

www.ribproject.org

Mireia, Gary and I visited the Radical Book Fair at the CCA as we’d been around taking photographs and talking around the city. They had been walking together and it will be interesting to share their views from Drumchapel and other parts of the city. You will find soon their views in a separate section.

I’ll add to the glossary section Jep’s pics and hopefully I’ll finish my glossary soon.

24th August

Sunday, a quiet day. I had been working is some texts, reading and organizing pics.

At Draw we had been collecting this days some ideas for future development and drafting some of the postcards/posters related with G15.

Today CityStrolls and us linked pages and we hope to meet in the future in some common action.

Visit: www.citystrolls.org

With Mireia we did a long walk along the Kelvin

25th August

Last day of this first stage. Work will be continuing and I’ll be coming later in the year.

This morning Mary and I visited Focal Point, one of the district community spaces, this one being a care centre for pensioners. We meet there some of the ladies users which live in the area for more than fifty years. It´s been a great experience and we will be working and knowing of their stories again.

Space is built socially, listening today we reached the conclusion that failed initiatives are due to the lack of engagement of different agencies and developers to the neighbours who inhabit the area.

We heard from our guests stories about: the first years of the district; the excellent commerce once located in the neighbourhood; songs dedicated to Drumchapel; the kids theatre at the backyards; stories that until know talk about a welcoming community despite any reputation the area has been building. We heard about simple solutions to build a community and how to make them work.

Later on the day an small group we had been doing a guided visit to the Bluebell wood. Drumchapel Woodland Group is a voluntary group of neighbours who have interest in the conservation of the woodlands in the area. Drumchapel enjoys a fantastic areas of wild nature, this beautiful edge of the city leads walkers and nature lovers around arear where to observe over 200 different plant species, different species of wildlife. This modellic project has been awarded and is visited for environmental students from Europe as a reference of a regeneration project.

The day has finished with a nice family meal and sharing some ideas on how the project will develop.

Tomorrow I’m going home and we’ll be working remotely with Draw, Mary, Gary and other people happy to collaborate with us.

26th August

Left today the city…I´m looking at the city changing rapidly, disappearing the industrial landscape. The new developments are turning cupulas, chimneys, sandstone for glass and metal structures, modern commercial areas, gated communities with dedicated roads…Let´s talk about that one of this days

Love to All. Log will continue in november. Meanwhile  other sections in the blog will be updated regularly.