Notes on a Changing Place

Mary Slessor Gardens, Dundee, Scotland, 2017.

The ideas behind this series of posters are: creating space, time and contexts for making and sharing, with a focus on the challenges faced in individual and social lives. Combining drawing and photography with collage techniques Tracy Mackenna & Edwin Janssen’s work offered an idiosyncratic view of Dundee and its continual reinvention. Referencing a wide range of historical and personal sources the artwork celebrated Dundee and its inhabitants by questioning preconceived ideas.

Notes on a changing Place was the artists’ contribution to the Sharing Not Hoarding public art project, located in Dundee city’s Waterfront Development. Offering 18 x 4-sheet billboard posters, the project provides opportunities for artists and the wider public to participate in the Waterfront Development, to raise questions about a collective future, and to celebrate a diversity of voices and visions for the city.

Aligning the ambitions of Sharing Not Hoarding and Tracy Mackenna & Edwin Janssen’s work to reach a variety of audiences, the posters and accompanying free publication were used as conversation pieces during a public engagement event, Notes on a changing Place: A gathering at The McManus, Dundee’s Art Gallery and Museum that explored the arts’ reflective and critical role against the backdrop of Dundee’s re-imagining.