Conductor, 8 Movements by Keith Harrison

Abstract

Conductor, 8 Movements by Keith Harrison with accompanying soundtrack by Preston Field Audio

Conductor was a live choreographed 60 minute interruption to the life of Preston Bus Station. On a Sunday morning 32 double-decker buses and drivers from Preston Bus and Stagecoach, steered their buses in slow and sequenced
movements from the bays and across the forecourt, trigged by volunteer performers in the passenger concourse. Preston Field Audio’s sound track of recordings and electronic loops was played through the bus station tannoy, responding to Keith Harrison’s schematic drawings. The whole haunting piece uniquely appropriated all the resources of the station to create a dramatic new work that celebrated the interaction between the people, vehicles and the architecture of the Europe’s biggest bus station. Live event was watched by 200 people and streamed online to a further 8,000.

The performance was recorded by filmmaker, Jared Schiller, and was represented in the Beautiful and Brutal exhibition across a number of screens, with a live recording of the soundtrack by Preston Field Audio.

Beautiful and Brutal: 50 Years in the Life of Preston Bus Station, a collaboration between Professor Charles Quick of In Certain Places and Curator of History James Arnold of the Harris Museum, Art Gallery and Library was a programme of new contemporary artist commissions culminating in an exhibition at the Harris Museum, and supplemented by an events programme that included architectural tours, a birthday party event hosted at Preston Bus Station itself and a conference hosted at the Harris. The project that set out to examine, reveal and promote the building’s significance to the people of Pres¬ton in terms of architecture, urban planning, social engagement and a source of artistic inspiration.

Commissioned artist Keith Harrison along with filmmaker Jared Schiller and Carl Brown of Preston Field Audio staged Conductor, a choreographed interruption into the daily life of Preston Bus Station. LOW PROFILE worked with a road marking company to create their site-specific text artwork PEOPLE, highlighting the role of the people of Preston in the creation and campaign to preserve Preston Bus Station. Filmmaker and artist Anna Raczynski made a series of 22 short films featuring interviews exploring a variety of individuals relationship with Preston Bus Station.

The three commissioned artworks were presented alongside archival exhibits and other works of contemporary art inspired by or featuring Preston Bus Station as part of the exhibition Beautiful and Brutal: 50 years in the life of Preston Bus Station.
The conference of the same name brought together experts from the fields of public art, architecture and historical collections to investigate the role of Preston Bus Station within the city and its importance both to the people of Preston and as an internationally renowned piece of architectural history.