What does it mean for an artwork to be designed specifically for the place it will live “forever”?

The first thing we do when we’re shortlisted for a public art project is visit a place. We try to understand what’s important about that place, physically and conceptually, absorbing as much tangible and intangible information as possible.

Usually, there is assistance from local organizations. Because the artwork in Airdrie was stewarded by STEPS Public Art and commissioned by the municipality, we began this project with a guided Site Visit – a valuable process of learning from the locals.

We got to visit the new building while it was under construction, seeing behind the scenes into the process of designing and constructing Inspire, Airdrie’s new Public Library & Multi-Use Facility.

It was wonderful to approach this site visit with the other shortlisted artists, learning together despite being in competition. Artists working in public space too seldom spend time in proximity with each other, and it was a pleasure going on this adventure with everybody in the same group.

Crafting an installation that physically & conceptually integrates into a place is increasingly important to us as artists. For work that is intended to live in a space for many years, we try to work as site-responsively as possible, absorbing the physical, conceptual, spiritual, and emotional values of that place into the artwork we design.

Sometimes this allows us to critique what (and who) is missing from that place, sometimes it simply allows us to acknowledge the work already going well and benefit from the collateral research of the team working feverishly to make a new place successful.

Because we intend to integrate ourselves and our future artwork into a given location, we are very careful about the types of places we work, avoiding overly commercial or branded scenarios where the art it secondary to economic interests. The Airdrie Public Library & Multi-Use Facility was the opposite of this, speaking to the growth of human knowledge and our desire to learn together. We have always wanted to make art for the library, we wanted to make the most of the opportunity as artists.

We knew that 53,000 sq feet of the new 73,000 sq ft building would be dedicated to the new Airdrie Public Library. Despite serving multiple purposes, Inspire is primarily a library.

The most important research we did, independent of the group, was spending time in the old Airdrie Public Library, talking to library staff, and trying to understand the role of the library in the community.

Our curiosity guided us into this retrofit pharmacy-turned-library and we spent several afternoons just sitting, watching how people use the space, and reading random books from the stacks.

We observed the diversity of people who walked through the doors – a map by the entrance tracking the international origins of library patrons.

We saw people of all ages, from families reading in the children’s area, to teenagers playing video games on the computers, to young professionals who just needed to use the printer, to adults searching for important books and navigating shelves of DVDs, to groups of seniors gathering in the back room to discuss important topics.

Airdrie is Alberta’s 5th biggest city, and it is growing at astronomical rates – one of the fastest growing municipalities in Canada. The Airdrie Public Library is one of the most used libraries per capital in the province. Visiting the old building, it was clear that it was bursting at the seams, over-used and outdated, desperately in need of more square footage and amenities.

The municipality of Airdrie clearly saw this need and prioritized a new library as part of their civic growth. The new building is beautiful, airy, and spacious, addressing both the library’s needs, and the needs of a community yearning for multi-use spaces.

And because the new purposes-built building addresses the physical needs of the Airdrie Public Library and surrounding community, we were free to begin envisioning an artwork to address the incredible leap of imagination required to fill this growing space with the best sort of magic.

More about that to come.