Stream | Peninsula Artist Commission: Performing Social Space :: November 2009 – July 2010

Stream is a creative production agency based in the London Borough of Greenwich, where our programmes bring together innovative art practice and local people. We invite artists to find inspiration in the geographies, peoples and locales in which our projects are sited and offer a stimulating environment in which to realise ambitious new work. We work in collaboration with the artists we commission to realise the full potential of projects, and are committed to creative excellence and meaningful participation in all the work we produce. We look for artists whose practice combines a conceptual sophistication with a lightness of touch, and are keen to support the professional development of the artists we commission.

Peninsula is a programme of creative projects produced by Stream. Its focus is the place and people of the Peninsula Ward in the London Borough of Greenwich, where a number of regeneration schemes are currently underway. The area has already undergone significant changes and will be transformed still further over the next ten years. These developments are bringing new residents and businesses to the area, to sit alongside the long established communities and light industries which have operated here for many years. The extraordinary natural and built environment encompasses grand perspectives over the River Thames, the O2 and surrounding developments including Ravensbourne College of Design and Technology’s spectacular new building, the disused gasworks as well as smaller residential streets.

The first phase of Stream’s Peninsula programme responded to the initial changes in the area, mapping some of its geographies and histories, and bringing together artists and local collaborators from new and established communities to investigate, record and reflect on their findings. New maps — printed, audio and online — have been produced, and films, performances and temporary installations have taken place across the Greenwich Peninsula.

We are now into the second phase of this programme of public art commissions, and are commissioning projects which seek to:

• investigate the Greenwich Peninsula, through local collaboration and participation
• stimulate debate to generate action and change
• develop connections and relationships between people across the Peninsula
• experiment with different models of creative practice

We would like the current commission to build on a project produced in this second phase of the programme: In A League of Our Own by artist Jayne Murray. Focusing on social activities and spaces, In a League of Our Own brought local people together through the activities they enjoy in a series of unique fixtures. It culminated in a pub quiz where teams of local residents competed to show off their knowledge of the area.