Creative Concept

While drawing from a historic context, the proposed work aims to provide a distinctly contemporary, iconic and unconventional sculptural aspect with high artistic integrity. The sculptures intend to give the impression of ‘walking on the sea bed’, offering unexpected and surprising aspects of vessels suspended in time and space. Each sculpture responds to a different era of development of Belfast Harbour and the City as well as the naval architecture of its time, consisting of:

a sculptural element of ship forms in bronze are informed by historic paintings that are cantilevered from the support ‘wall’, showing textured hulls and sails as well as linear elements such as masts, spars and lines. Sails fabricated from two sheets to create volume and depth while the use of pressure and tensile members (structural stainless steel cable to resemble tackle and mooring lines) give the cantilevered ships a floating and ethereal feel.
a ‘harbour wall’ element which provides the structural support and lends an architectural dimension to the sculptures. Two material variants to be considered: preferably cast concrete (textured white or gray) or alternatively Cor-Ten® weathering steel (with back-lit laser-cut text). The concrete variant can incorporate form liners imprinted text elements as well as texture (e.g. wave patterns, timber structures or clinker/carvel texture, steps of graving docks, text, rope or linen symbolism). The top of the wall incorporates a low-relief of the buildings in the paintings (not shown in model) using form liners.
a multimedia element via a QR code on each sculpture that links to a webpage containing information about the ships, period and referenced artwork (the code on this page links to a sample page).