BANFF – A new public art project on Bear Street will have an artist whose work has been exhibited across the country take the reigns.
The Banff Community Art Committee announced Tiffany Shaw was selected as the artist for the project, which will aim to reflect the community in a sculpture with a vision for the work to be decided in the coming months.
“I was very honoured,” Shaw said. “I am pinching myself that people know my name and they are interested in my point of view.”
Tiffany, an interdisciplinary artist, will now spend the next several months working with a professional curator hired by the committee before creating the work.
“I am trying to narrow down, to synthesize the idea for the project,” Shaw said. “I have some ideas that are loosely connected but not quite into a concept.”
Shaw hopes to channel the idea of seasons changing for her artwork, which will be a sculpture.
“I am trying to reflect the environment back within the Town of Banff,” Shaw said. “I am really trying to reflect the shifting of nature in the town.”
The project fits perfectly into what Shaw does, as she is also an architect and enjoys bringing both of her backgrounds into practice.
“Hopefully it makes both practices richer,” Shaw said. “I am always interested in creating spaces that make people reflect about what their purpose is there, to make a space that is greater than ourselves.”
The art committee did two calls to start with but they were not happy with the results to make sure the investment in Bear Street would represent the town.
“We went another route and we hired a curator who specializes in public art,” said Charlene Quantz-Wold, chair of the Community Art Committee. “We talked about what the committee had hoped to produce for the town.”
At that point, Shaw was asked if she would consider working on the project and selected for the role.
The Bear Street redevelopment was completed in 2021 and focused on making it a pedestrian-priority street in the middle of Banff. The project replaced the underground utilities, installed block pavers, public seating, planters and a public space that would include public art.
“When the Bear Street revitalization was brought forward to the art committee, the Town of Banff proposed we could commission something for that space,” Quantz-Wold said. “We haven’t had the opportunity to commission something for almost a decade.”
The Bear Street work will be funded by the Banff art reserve, up to $105,000 for all materials, installation, transport and commission fee.
Spaces such as Bear Street are important from an artistic standpoint, Quantz-Wold said, because they help people see themselves represented in some way and help them see the spaces in a new and different way.
“Bear Street has been redesigned for connections and engagement and for people to gather,” Quantz-Wold said. “It was a logical place to animate with some public artwork. There was a huge opportunity there where the space could be designed with artwork in mind, rather than being fit into something else.”
The proposed installation date will be in the fall of 2023, but that could change.
“We are still looking at the installation deadline,” Quantz-Wold said. “We are not exactly sure. That is the hope but we will see where we get.”
