DOGLondon2010

DOGLondon2010. This is the story of Akane Takayama’s award-winning DOG Sculpture Installation in London in 2010. A groundbreaking work based on very simple concepts but involving many layers, not least possibly the first intrinsic use of Social Media as a fundamental element of the installation long before “selfies” were ever a vogue. Ostensibly a simple work, DOG is a complex construction delivering a raft of outcomes for the communities involved. Takayama’s vision of conceptual contemporary art potentially being a vehicle for community expression and redefining it beyond the world of wealthy patronage and the institution of galleries is realised in her DOG sculptures.

This web page tells the story of an astonishing contemporary art sculpture and how it impacts on communities.

Note: estimated audience figures are based on the numbers of the leaflets handed out on the day.

The installation at Victoria Park, East London, was the first DOG sculpture. For once, the weather was pleasant and the audience engaged with the work over two days. the popularity of this public art work was immediate and when the end of each day came, Takayama’s team were hard pressed handing the DOGs out.

estimated audience 1600

Holland Park, Knightsbridge, London was the third installation in the DOGLondon2010 production. The venue was slightly different because rather than an expansive display area, at Holland Park DOG found itself in the splendid entrance avenue which leads into the park.

estimated audience 1200

DOGLondon2010

Takayama’s concept of providing a truly accessible contemporary art installation included the idea of giving away for free the DOGs at the end of each installation. This was tied into her idea that the whole concept of DOG would move from the physical to the virtual space of digital media. The internet was to be the gallery for her DOG sculpture work. In 2010, this was an innovatory move and the popularity and dominance of the phenomenon of ‘selfies’ did not at that moment really exist. However, at every installation, people were using their new smart phones to capture images of themselves with the DOGs.

On handing out the DOGs, the team talked to the audience about the desire of the artist that they pose their DOGs in their own artistic constructs and post their images online. In this way, Takayama’s desire to see the audience participation evolve beyond the physical installation into their own creative expression was realised.

A search of ‘DOG by Akane Takayama’ brings up an extensive online gallery of this work and draws in images from other works by Takayama. A range of search terms around DOG, sculpture, installation, Akane Takayama, London, also produces impressive results. As can also be seen in the image above, sponsors and funders have their own logos drawn into this gallery.

Conceptually Takayama envisaged DOG to be an artwork which engaged not just people but a community. Whilst the primary statement about the sculpture was concerning how people value the material things in their lives, this participation of other people was seen as an act of engagement intrinsic to the purpose of the artist. Takayama wanted to create a contemporary sculpture which people could not just approach but become part of through their own interactions.

Takayama’s workshops in the schools ran for one day. The teachers had been provided with a workshop pack in which she had laid out the timetable for the workshop and a detailed, step by step, illustrated, task flow. Sometimes single handedly, sometimes with members of her team, Takayama would work with the children and guide them through each stage to the production of their own models.

“The children thoroughly enjoyed working with you to create their animals and were incredibly engaged throughout the entire experience.” Comment by UK School Teacher.

In the hundreds of three-dimensional models which were produced, there are some stunning examples of both creativity and comprehension. Takayama’s purpose was to release the creative ability of the children and to help them understand their own potential to be artists. She talked with the children about what it meant to be an artist, how it is a career, and how her studio worked. Finally, she took the kid’s models away and arranged public installations for their work.

These messages ranged from expressions of hope for world peace, calls to stop bullying and crime and hopes for a healthy environment. Amongst this range every now and again the idiosyncratic would appear such as the wish for a socialist government!

As the schools involved were mostly in deprived areas of London there was an obvious expression of cultural diversity within the messages which make this aspect of the work open to many sorts of sociological investigation.

In many ways it appeared that, on reading the messages, there was a question about how it is our growth into adulthood separates us from the open aspirations and simple ideas we have when we are young.