What?

The Cultural Masterplan is the blueprint for a regeneration project of extraordinary scale and ambition in Sunderland and a bold new model for involving art and artists in the regeneration of a city. This website is a call for artists to register their interest in being considered for commissions, both temporary and permanent over the next ten years.

Who?

Not only practising artists, but experimental engineers and scientists, cosmologists and clock makers, thinkers and makers, these commissions aren’t only about artworks they are as much about involving artists in the regeneration of Sunderland. So by artist we really mean any professional practice where there is an interest and ability to creatively influence physical projects in the city.

Scale?

There are three commission scales for both itinerant (temporary) and permanent commissions:

• £500 - £25,000
• £25,000 - £100,000
• £100,000 and over

How to register interest?

Its simple and you can do it online, now.

Chose six images of your work, write a caption for each image and then a text of up to 150 words about your past work, and what you might be interested in developing in the future. Its that simple. Click here for the registration page.

The commissions.

Sunderland has attracted £1.5 billion of investment over the next 10 years to reshape the city. Wherever possible the city would like to involve artists in both the thinking and making for these new building projects, so that each new project is transformed by something innovative that engages the people of Sunderland.

Both itinerant and permanent works are being commissioned. The principal criteria for commissions in years one to three are that commissions will engage either with a specific building project or area to be transformed, and the artists are being called upon to undertake works that will transform a space and place and will engage people in Sunderland.

Each time the Cultural Masterplan is ready to commission an artist the panel of 3 (the lead artist or cultural master planner for Sunderland, Sunderland Arc and the City of Sunderland) will select 3 artists from this call for artists for interview.

One candidate will then be given a contract and fee to come up with a design and costed proposal in collaboration with the design team.

Registration.

To register go to the registration page of this site.

After you register your images and text will be posted on the site for six weeks.

The Cultural Masterplan curators will then select some of these registrants to stay on the site for possible shortlisting in the rolling programme of commissions.

CallForArtists.org is a free and an open access public resource, being shared with curators for other projects internationally.

Updating your Registration.

You can update the text and images on your registration by completing a new registration using the same email address and details and this will subsequently replace your old registration.

More.

The backbone of all of this is a programme called The Cultural Masterplan. Here's a quote,

“A regeneration project of extraordinary scale is underway to regenerate Sunderland (population 280,000). The Cultural Masterplan defines three mechanisms to embed projects within this physical regeneration programme and to effect cultural regeneration through physical regeneration.”

Click here to view The Cultural Masterplan for Sunderland.