Ideas & Proposals
The Urban Farm
Art into Landscape
The farm should primarily be a source of education and pleasure for schoolchildren and adults. Guided tours and a lecture programme will be organised and available to the public. The three fields adjoining the farm will practice crop rotation including experimental crops, such as hops, sweet corn and vines. The mixed larm will be stocked with popular breeds of cattle, sheep, goats, chickens and ducks.
Finally the walled garden would enclose beehives surrounded by bee attracting trees and shrubs. Nothing would delight me more than to observe a man in a city suit, with bowler and rolled umbrella lean over a gate in the centre of London and enquire as to whether the milk yield is up this month.
Farm and three enclosed fields for Kensington Gardens
Not only will the farm and fields provide an element of surprise, but as it is obviously out of context, situated in the centre of London, it will be more didactic than if found in a rural situation. As it is enclosed in Kensington Gardens, it must blend subtlety with the pastoral environment. This notion will be conveyed by the design of the farm buildings, which must not look rustic to the point of appearing inefficient. At the same time, it must not look like an agricultural show of the latest farming methods. The use of building materials will be important. I suggest the use of traditional materials -used red brick and stone.
Prize winner of Art into landscape, sponsored by Art Council & The Sunday Times, the Urban Farm.
A FARM IN CENTRAL LONDON was a proposal and installation exhibited at The Serpentine Gallery in the ‘Art into Landscape ‘ Exhibition in September 1974.
This completion was the first of a series which encouraged artists and designers who were working in the direction of site specific / installations/ public art. To quote from the catalogue “ ways in which open spaces might be developed for public use and public pleasure”.
The proposal for this working farm in the centre of London was the first of its kind and won second prize.
The idea came to me from many directions:
The agricultural workers were lobbying Parliament in the Spring of 1974 for better pay and working conditions - but how can you tell people in London exactly how tough working on a farm and the land is in reality ? [even though Jim Callaghan was the Prime Minister at the time and he was supposed to be a farmer !]
I was brought up next to this farm in Leicestershire and so I proposed we copy the 18th century plan but adapting the out buildings to accommodate the public, including an Educational Centre and Cafe.
As an artist, I am fascinated by opposites and displacements of all kinds. In this case I was bringing the outside view of the the sight or site of the farm into the Serpentine Gallery and I was also bringing a rural occupation of the farm and farming into an urban space.
Mirrors were placed at strategic positions outside and inside the gallery space on the wallto bring us a reflection of the site itself.
Sir Hugh Casson, who was one of the competition judges, asked the Queen if she would give permission for the farm to be built in Kensington Gardens. She said it was impossible as rules had been laid down centuries ago for what could take place in the Royal Parksand farms were not included……and so that was that.
However, very soon later urban farms were built- but they have always been a token gesture. Surely there must be an opportunity to have a proper working farm with fields, crop rotation etc in the centre of a city.