2020 - ongoing
PLoT
The PLoT (People's Land Trust) project reimagines the future sustainability of urban land use and custodianship for the next 200 years on Cork City's Northside. With an experimental approach, the project merges the principles of a radical school with the Community Land Trust (CLT) model in a co-creative social art project involving local residents.
Formed in 2019 and collaborating with artists Marilyn Lennon and Elinor Rivers, the project uses artistic methodologies, including dialogue, critical pedagogy, mapping, performative actions, and the creation of objects. It draws on the ideological foundations of CLTs, which enable communities to collaboratively shape and plan their futures through democratic processes.In envisioning the future of urban land use in Cork, the project addresses wider interconnected concerns, such as ecology, population growth, climate change, social relations, public policy, cultural practices, city infrastructure, and interspecies habitation, aiming to create a more sustainable and equitable vision for the city’s development.
Future, Land, Commons
Public Billboards
(Triptych digital prints 40"x30")
Cork City Northside
2020
Seeding a vision for an urban Community Land Trust in Cork, a series of three billboards displayed across various public locations on the city's Northside. These billboards serve as provocations to spark conversation and reflection within the community. They ask the question: How do we, as a community, imagine and think about models for collective ownership, stewardship, and future urban land use?
PLoT Radical Summer School
The PLoT Radical Summer School took place in July 2021, bringing together a group of residents from Cork City Northside to engage in a series of workshops and events. At the heart of the school was a DIY ethos, through which PLoT constructed and built three mobile handcarts as tools for public engagement. These handcarts served as infrastructure for civic co-learning and future visioning, enabling participants to collaboratively explore key issues around urban land use, climate, social relations, cultural practices, and interspecies inhabitation.
Throughout the summer, the handcarts were used at various locations to spark discussions and creative thinking on future urban land use, including resource mapping, community values, ethics, and the challenges posed by climate change. The hands-on approach emphasized the importance of collective action and the potential for community-driven solutions to address the interconnected concerns of the future.
PLoT handcarts and summer school artefacts were on public display at Hollyhill Library from July to September 2021, offering a tangible representation of the community’s visions for a more sustainable and equitable urban future.
The project is funded by the Arts Council of Ireland and Cork City Council Arts Office. It is a Cork City Partnership and Cork City Libraries supported project with additional production support from Sirius Arts Centre.
