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| The shop opens at the start of June and until then we are using it as a workspace, artist studio etc. The windows are going to be a curated gallery space where we will every week exhibit work in progress, documentation and work made during workshops with ROC Creative and Curledge Street Primary School. These photos are from Week 1 ( this week!!) and we are this week sharing information about us, the project and some key images with local people. As I was installing the information lots of people stopped and had a chat, wanted to know more and I got to meet our neighbour (behind us!) Rob. Rob told me about the very old trees and vines that he has in his garden which he thinks could date back to the time when vines were grown in Winner Street to make wine for the Bishop in his palace round the corner. |
Week 1. Each week Gareth and Holly will be changing the window display.
Below, week 2
“OYEZ
OYEZ
Where has the Flat Pole
cabbage gone?”
Flat pole cabbages
Many years ago Flat pole cabbages used to be grown all around
Winner Street and also in Palace Avenue Gardens. Paignton was so well known for growing the Flat pole cabbage
that for a time residents of Paignton were known as ‘Flat Poles’. The cabbage
was so sweet in flavor that it was a staple part of Paignton resident’s diet
and as it grew so plentifully it was also used to feed farmers animals. This
variety of cabbage is now apparently extinct and until the 1970’s was mainly
used as cattle feed.
Displayed here is the Savoy cabbage
which is the closest existing variety to the Flat pole. The Savoy cabbages are placed in old
wine boxes; these boxes reference the story about Winner Street being a
vineyard that provided wine for the Bishop in his nearby palace. Winner Street
was originally called Wynerde
Street, Wynerde means vineyard.
The Flat pole cabbage was very important to the shop keepers,
families and farmers that used to live and work around Winner Street. This installation is a memorial to
Winner Streets agricultural heritage. It also could prompt memories and maybe
provoke questions for the viewer.
The memories could include recipes made using Flat pole cabbage or even
memories of them being grown locally.
The questions could be “What happened to the vineyards?” and “What
remains today to remind us of the farmers that used to live and work around
Winner Street?”
Holly Smith
April 2012
Week 5
Holly and Gareth and Winner Street
Window with text
This film has no audio.
Week 3
Clay models of houses and shops on Winner Street (not to scale)
Air drying clay (unglazed, unfinished, still drying)
Made by Year 4 children from Curledge Street Primary School
April 2012
During April 2012 children from Year 4 undertook a site visit to Winner Street. Prior to the visit they had learnt about the history of Winner Street during a presentation by Ken Rowe of Paignton History Society. On their visit they made sketches of one shop or building on Winner Street and also made notes about the other things they saw and heard while there.
Following the visit they then each made a clay model of the building they had sketched. Artist Holly Smith led the workshop alongside teachers. Parents were then invited into school to have a look at the models and find out more about the Winner: highstreet neighbourhood project. Many of the children commented that they now knew more about Winner Streets history, had learnt more about making things from clay and had had a great time!
Once the clay has dried it will be painted white. All the models will be then be put together to make a ‘scale model’ version of the street. The model will then be installed onto a farmhouse kitchen table and exhibited at Paignton Library during June 2012.
Architects models of streets or new buildings present the viewer with a ‘bigger picture’ of where they live or could live. The viewer can notice the features of the street and also see interesting architecture or connections between where they live and the rest of the street. The ‘Model Village’ is a tourist attraction, quite often located in or near seaside towns. By using this form we acknowledge the importance of tourism in Paignton and also present Winner Street in a new form. Placing the model on a farmhouse kitchen table quite literally puts contemporary Winner Street back in the middle of its agricultural and farming heritage.
Gareth Ballyn
May 2012
Week 4
'Buy one get one free'
Buy one get one free!
This
drawing is like a giant poster advertising the products sold on Winner Street,
past and present. These images illustrate
the variety of things Winner Street used to sell and what is sold today.
The
colours used and the informal style of layout contrasts with the types of
images used in advertising many years
ago. It also reminds us of the
‘traditional’ processes used when all images in advertisements used to be hand
drawn.
It
is also worth reflecting on the importance of colour being used in printed
advertising today. To draw attention to
this there are some examples of original black and white advertisements for shops
or products sold on Winner Street. It is also interesting to see how
advertisements ‘back in the day’ used text so creatively to sell or promote.
Holly
Smith
May
2012
Holly and Gareth and Winner Street
Window with text
Film showing in opposite window
This film has no audio.
Holly and Gareth and
Winner Street
Artist Holly Smith and curator Gareth Ballyn share their
ideas and experiences of working on Winner Street during an interview with
artist Ria J Hartley. Smith and Ballyn
regularly use interviews as a way to reflect on their work. On this occasion
they are discussing the early stages of work during the Winner: highstreet
neighbourhood project*. The accompanying
film has no sound but features Smith and Ballyn walking up Winner Street. Key words or phrases such as ‘collaborate, people, nostalgia, actions or
interactions, pretty perfect, home, shape of the street, bread and milk,
straight forward and left over ’ have
been taken from the interview text and overlaid onto the image.
Gareth Ballyn
May 2012
*Please note that some of the things mentioned in the transcribed interview may or may
not happen!
Richard the sign painter
Look at our beautiful number 93.
Sitting outside
As the weather gets warmer the shopkeepers on Winner Street set up a chair outside their shops and enjoy the sun. The other day Lucinda from Soundart popped over and while we were doing some soundtrack trials she and her daughter took a seat outside no.93.
What a lovely display!
Look at this fantastic display in the Palace Theatre foyer advertising the project. Big thank you to the team at the Palace for their support.
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