History

A BRIEF HISTORY OF PUBLIC ART IN DUNDEE

People have been making art in this area for thousands of years – the Balgarthno Stone Circle is arguably the city’s oldest piece of public art. The real starting point, however, was in 1863, when John Steell’s statue of David Baxter was unveiled at the opening of Baxter Park. This began a short-lived trend for statues of notable people, while at the same time decorative carving on buildings became increasingly popular. The fashion came to an abrupt end with the outbreak of the Great War, and for the next sixty years a relatively small number of new artworks appeared in the city (mostly murals for shops, cafes and factory canteens, none of which survives today). The turning point came in 1981 with the establishment of the pioneering Blackness Public Art Programme, which used art as a tool for economic regeneration for the first time. It brought together artists, planners, architects, engineers, businesses and local residents in a ground-breaking approach to the transformation of the Blackness area.

The Blackness scheme proved so popular that it was extended city-wide and became the Public Art Dundee Programme in 1985. This was the first on-going programme of public art in any city in Scotland and remained the largest of its kind throughout its existence. It attracted international attention and led to the creation of dozens of pieces across Dundee. The programme came to an end in 2003 when its regular grant funding was withdrawn but by then the city had adopted a Percent for Art Policy, meaning that a certain percentage of the costs of any major building development had to be spent on public art. The City Council have continued to commission art through this policy ever since.

As well as formally commissioned work there has also been a steady growth of community-based art – initially through the City Council’s Environmental Arts team and more recently through local group projects like Dighty Connect. There have also been exciting new initiatives like Open/Close Dundee and several legal graffiti walls. The number of new artworks appearing in the city every year is extraordinary, but all too often older pieces fall into neglect. We hope that this website will help to raise awareness of all the amazing art in our city, old and new!