Antonia appears on Gardeners Question Time with Harun Morrison for feature on Gladstone Park’s groundbreaking land art installation

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Gardeners Question Time on Radio 4 features a report on the country’s first art installation dealing with the contested history of a green space. The episode was broadcast on 26th November.

Antonia and Harun are interviewed by presenter Ashley Edwards and talk about the work’s associations and meanings as well as the horticultural elements of the planting design.

To listen to the feature click on the image above or the link below. The feature begins at 18:36 minutes: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001fd98

See previous post to find out more about the installation CLICK HERE

Antonia Couling collaborates with artist Harun Morrison to create a groundbreaking new public artwork to acknowledge contested history in Gladstone Park

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The Anchor, The Drum, The Ship (2022), a groundbreaking public artwork for Gladstone Park designed by the London-based artist Harun Morrison and garden designer Antonia Couling.

This is the first time in the UK’s history that a public artwork of this kind has been used to acknowledge the contested history of a green space. The permanent artwork will be unveiled on 14 October to coincide with Black History Month in October.

Gladstone Park is named after 19th-century Prime Minister Sir William Gladstone whose father was one of the biggest slave-owners in the Caribbean. Gladstone went from being a supporter of the compensation scheme to denouncing slavery and cutting ties with his father.

Investigating contested history has become a vital undertaking in recent years. Explaining how and why links to the slave trade and British colonialism might have allowed a person who has been venerated with a statue, mon-ument or place or street name to rise to prominence in the first place sheds light on a dark history that can no longer be left untold.

The artwork:

The constellation of planted shapes that make up The Anchor, The Drum, The Ship (2022) offers a set of triangulation points to create conversation around Black migration, belonging, communication, music and collective renewal. The work is spatially in dialogue with the remnants of Dollis Hill House, a former property that regularly received Prime Minister William Gladstone.

LINKS:

GARDENERS’ QUESTION TIME (Begins at 18:36 mins)