Landmarks - Page 2

garinda · 15-06-2006, 18:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by Margaret Pilkington

There were some pics in tonights LET....but they weren't particularly attractive...however the LET told us that it gave a wonderful view of the town.

The thing is there is already a fantastic view from up there. I don't see how this is improving it.

I have nothing against public art, or indeed modern art, my only criteria is that it should be good or at least challenging. This just looks dire, and will certainly not stand the test of time. In fact it already looks passe.

Gayle · 15-06-2006, 19:35

So it's a lose-lose situation isn't it? We put challenging pieces in front of you and you hate them, we put subtle and understated ones in front of you and you hate them too.

Guinness · 15-06-2006, 19:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gayle

As for the name - I know it means circular prison but it also means Pan (panoramic) opticon (to see)

Pan..A cooking pot
Op...contractive of Operation
Tic..an involuntary twitch
On..an operational indicator

Pa....contraction of ..Father
Nop.contraction of 'no problem' used in text, more often contracted to 'np'
Ti...Chemical symbol for Titanium
Con...a rip off

What was it that Abraham Lincoln said?

Guinness · 15-06-2006, 20:12

I used to go up to Corporation park with my gran in the 60's...if it was nice weather we'd take some sandwiches and a bottle of Orange (3d back on the bottle)....we didnt go for the 'panopticon' (whatever that definition) we went because it was a 'PARK'

MY point is...Guinness first law..it does not matter how much publicity you give an attraction that has nothing for the youth of today or how much press you get..it is still futile!

Gayle · 15-06-2006, 20:28

Things go out of fashion - parks go out of fashion. Sometimes you need something to remind people that things still exist. People will visit the park again because they'll be reminded about it and when they're in there they'll remember all the things that they used to love.

My guess is that a number of people who post on here (even people who don't like it) will go and visit it. That's people who may remember it but also people who have never been before. People from outside the area will see the publicity and they too will visit it and see all the other great things the park has to offer.

Guinness · 15-06-2006, 20:47

Nope..ALL children know about parks..they grow up there..behind the bike sheds...in the bowling pavilion..third hydrangea from the right..etc...

We dont need panopticons, we need little men in huts in summer selling time on the tennis courts, providing bowls for the bowling greens and clubs for the putting greens..we need paid employees walking round the park ensuring safety...Much more important than modern day 'follies'

Gayle · 15-06-2006, 20:58

Parents take children to parks but these days parents are taking their children to Sealife, Eureka, indoor play areas, etc. Parents don't let their children go to parks any more because they believe they are full of bad men.

Gayle · 15-06-2006, 21:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by Guinness

we need little men in huts in summer selling time on the tennis courts, providing bowls for the bowling greens and clubs for the putting greens..we need paid employees walking round the park ensuring safety...

Agree with you on this point!

Madhatter · 15-06-2006, 21:33

all follies were once modern day, and our parks are full of them.

youths are not interested in parks with or without panopticans, kids are, adults are, if there's something to do there.
Rawtenstall has tennis courts and bowling green. dunno if they're on my gallery pics but they're there. other than that parks are out of fasion, and most are run down. Bacup parks fairy dell is a perfect example, it's a beautiful park with a cascading stream, but it's under used because it went out of fasion and got run down to the point now that non of the cascades are working. Kids love that place, they think it's magical, I've heard them say, they'd love it even more if it was working properly and was clean and tidy, and so would the adults. Somewhere to sit would be nice, watch the world go by.
Thats just an example not all parks have streams so those without need something. some sort of interest or it's not a park it's just a piece of green field.
I'll go to see them when I'm up that way gayle and I'll photograph them and put them on my site with all my other monuments and sculptures, the blackpool ones, the doncaster brick train engine, the Stoke on Trent michelin men roundabout, the cowboy sherifs at popular 2000 services at warrington, the mersey wave. our shrove tuesday football games sculpture.

What I would like to do here, is get artists to sculpture pictures in rope light and decorate the town, with them, like christmas lights but they'd be based on book characters cos we're a booktown, they'd only be on as end of summer of course. that would need lots of money though and I wouldn't know were to start.

seems a bit mixed up that, but I see them as art, and something to look at, brighten the place up, tidy a place up, they are a modern day folly. You just need the right thing in the right place. I do think that one of the things against the hyndburn thing is that people see that all that money has been spent on the town centre and it's still bare, yet money is being spent on a panopticon in the middle of nowhere.

Madhatter · 15-06-2006, 21:33

have you not got tennis courts and bowling in your parks then?

garinda · 15-06-2006, 22:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gayle

So it's a lose-lose situation isn't it? We put challenging pieces in front of you and you hate them, we put subtle and understated ones in front of you and you hate them too.

I don't hate it, I'm just under whelmed. I'll reserve final judgement until I've seen it though.

The fact that they may be affordable doesn't mean they are, or are going to be great artists. It doesn't have the grandeur of the enviromental art of Christos, or even the subtlety of Tracy Emin's bird at Liverpool. It just looks so measly.

You mentioned before we both like Gormley's beach people. I would rather have one piece of world class art than lots of things in our area that don't stand up in the art world nationally, never mind on the international art scene.

Madhatter · 15-06-2006, 22:20

so you would like something then, just that nobody seems to have said what is acceptable yet so they've given up on you.

yerself · 15-06-2006, 23:52

I blame the why-aye men. They started it with their 'Angel of The North' and ever since the rest of the country has been trying to emulate them. The geordies' heap of rusting steel knocks any of these crackpot panopticon ideas into a cocked hat.

yerself · 15-06-2006, 23:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tealeaf

I've just had a peep at the Panopticons site.

I bet you signed up for the e-mail updates.

garinda · 16-06-2006, 00:01

It would have fulfilled the brief better if they had built a great big towering phallus people could have climbed up to see the view even clearer.

The Victorians had more idea about publicly acceptable art/follies than we do today. Plus it would have been there for centuries rather than a few vandalised years.