Chris Helson: We spoke last when you were just beginning the implementation of your designs within the corridor, during that interview (see video) you outlined a number of ideas that together would work to de-institutionalise the corridor. Could you talk about how those ideas progressed and how the work developed during its making?

Donald Urquhart: There is a fundamental difference between a studio made work for exhibition in a gallery and a commissioned work, such as the redevelopment of the corridor at Dykebar. This is that the ideas essentially have to be fully articulated prior to implementation. The time, therefore, for the progression and exploration of ideas is during the research phase - which is why this period is always of critical importance to the success or otherwise of the project. It is at this point that the creative process is almost entirely located, defined within a specific set of contexts.

I think this can be clearly illustrated in this instance by noting the similarities between the images of the completed works and the computer generated images which were prepared in advance of work starting.

Photograph of the finished corridor.

Computer generated simulation of the corridor.

That said there were several minor alterations - fine tuning - to what I proposed. These were in response to practical issues and I would not define them as developments. They did not substantially alter my conceptual approach to addressing the psychological experience of inhabiting the space.


Corridor prior to redevelopment

CH: In terms of your 'psychological experience of the space', could you talk about the journey from research and concept development through 2d design and virtual reality simulation to the finished work?

DU: In view of what I have stated about having the design articulated prior to work beginning there is a responsibility placed on the initial creative process. It is here that direct and analytical observation of the space is critical - to see how it changes at different times, how it is populated, how it is used etc. Through this process a body of research material is gathered, both written and visual. The primacy of drawing is of importance in this process. From this a framework idea (or set of ideas) is developed.

At this stage the process has similarities, for me, to developing a painting in the studio in that basic ideas are tested, revisited. One is constantly visualising the concepts and trying them out against the research and experiences that comprise to create an understanding of the space.

It is when this framework of ideas was in place that the important process of consultation with various stakeholders and users of the space begins. Through this process of consultation a greater understanding of the space is garnered from different experiential perspectives allowing the framework idea to be refined and adjusted towards a more fully developed set of creative decisions.

At this point a three-dimensional scale model was created allowing me to paint surfaces, again affording a period of adjustment with the opportunity to fine tune colour-field relationships and to gauge the psychological environment being created from the perspective of journeying through the space. Again, being in the space over time allows this to be further considered and the adjustments tested through visualisation. From the outset it had been clear to me that a priority should be to vary the experiential journey through the space by subtly changing colour, tone and form along the length of the space. The manipulation of light was also a key component in this.



In terms of the psychological experience of the space, of course, this can never be fully accounted until the work is realised. The experience of working in the corridor was, again, comparable to my studio practice in that the work slowly emerges through labour and time, honing the work towards completion. The gradual nature of completing such a large scale work (600 square metres of surface) is rewarding as the feel and atmosphere of the space begins to change as the work progresses. The incremental nature of the changes, over time, was a necessary aspect of the implementation to ensure a gradual disappearance of the familiar - appropriate for a space used by patients with organic degenerative conditions where changes of environment could not happen suddenly.

As well as the psychological changes that gradually occurred as colour and tone changed the formal aspect of the two built out areas also aided the realisation of my concepts when they were implemented. These were key components in altering both movement through the space and manipulating the relentlessness of the perspectival views which had been psychologically terrifying about the space.



CH: Conceptually, how do you feel your intention for the space matches up with the reality of the finished work?

DU: With the concepts for the space being almost fully developed before work began the finished work is largely a physical realisation of extant ideas. So the realisation has few real discoveries, it is more akin to the evolution of the expected. In that respect the conceptual intention exactly matches the completed reality.

However, an over riding reality of trying to de-institutionalise a space at the heart of an institution is that the surrounding environment, and therefore the journey to the space, hugely informs the experience of the space itself. The physical boundary of the space and its interface with the other existing areas is where the aim of making the space redolent of the natural world begins to break down. This is particularly so with the atrium space at one end of the corridor which visually informs much of the experience of the space.



CH: What if anything of the finished work surprised you?

DU: In the way the works were implemented there were two elements that were amongst the last to be installed - the larch heartwood beams and the replacement of areas of clear glass with white opaque to create screens to hold light. Although the space was virtually complete the installation of these elements at a late stage massively moved the space towards my intention. The positive but disproportionate effect of these two elements was due to the fact that they were designed to directly interact with users of the space - whereas other elements of the design worked on a more subliminal level. Seeing these elements installed was surprising, and something of a relief, in the degree to which they advanced the experience of the space closer to my intention.

The way light enters the space and its difference at different times and how that interacts with the design is more dramatic and uplifting than I had anticipated.

The main surprise though is the lack of surprise, in that the reality of the completed space matches the model and other visualisations.

CH You spent quite a long time working in the corridor over a few months, were you conscious of any changes in the way people used or responded to the evolving space?

DU: That is a difficult question to answer for two reasons. Firstly, the very act of working in the space with an assistant meant that there was an activity out with the normal within the space. The main experience of the hospital is one of routine and tedium. Put simply being in the space altered how people used the space. Judging how the usage of the space altered would be more easily evaluated now the work is complete rather than during the more performative act of working within it.

Secondly, as the artist, one has expectations and anticipated outcomes and how much one projects them onto activity within the corridor is difficult to objectively gauge.

That said several observations were encouraging. People using the dayrooms off the corridor tended to congregate behind the opaque glass, seeking out the areas of seclusion I had purposely created. Similarly, the wooden beams created an instant reaction in that patients immediately began to interact with them - with some spending time just running there hands over the wood responding to its tactile qualities. One particularly poignant comment from one patient touching the wood was ‘it reminds me of when I was young and used to go outside’.



What was apparent during the time I worked in the space is that the corridor did transform from a place of passage - a space to move through - to a space to be. Some staff were hostile to the fact that the work would encourage patients to loiter in the corridor, particularly as the larch beams provided seating. I took this as a positive thing as the reality was that patients already spent inordinate periods of time wandering up and down the space. I had accepted this reality and created a calmer and more restful environment in which they could spend time.

Prior to work in the corridor beginning if people did congregate it tended to be in the atrium space at the end of the corridor, which has no external views. As the work developed I did observe that people inhabited the corridor more, accepting its transformed sense of a place to be more than a transitional place. This allowed them greater visual access to the outside and natural world with the focussed views out into the courtyard garden that the work created.

CH: What did the opportunity to work in collaboration with an environmental psychologist bring to the work?

DU: Essentially support and a sense of an endorsement of my ideas from a specialist in this area of understanding. This was particularly important at the outset when the corridor was identified by both of us as such a psychologically troubling space and an area where the consideration of this project could make a significant impact.

Throughout the process there was an understanding of what I was trying to achieve from Dr Edgerton and it was supportive to me as I was trying to change, through art, the psychology of an environment and to have the opportunity for dialogue with an environmental psychologist.

CH: When engaging in this type of commission, what do you value most in the process with reference to your artistic practice?

DU: The opportunity to interface the basic philosophies that underpin my practice with a particular and specific set of contexts. The challenges and disciplines that this brings affords a rigorous evaluation of my core concerns as an artist. There is also the immediacy of engaging with a particular social context in which I feel more directly that my practice, with its concerns of spatial relationships and aesthetics, engages meaningfully with an audience. The practice of altering the meaning of a space through formal concerns of colour, tone, form and light has a directness, responsibility and social engagement in this type of commission that is sometimes more tenuous in other aspects of my practice.

Donald Urquhart acknowledges with thanks the assistance of the artist Nic Newton in realising this project.