Leave Art, Take Art, Love Art

We reported earlier on the “Billericay Voices” meeting held at the human kind Café in Billericay High Street, attended by President-Elect Stephen King and Rtn. Peter Greene, at which a final Art project for Billericay was chosen.

The selected project for a community art trail to celebrate culture and arts in our community, was called “Free Little Art Galleries” (FLAGs) by Lizzie Mellish-Dix. The projected launch date for this project is planned to be December 20 in the human kind cafe, with the main “action” taking place in January.

A ZOOM meeting was held by Hannah Stacey (Communities Manager) from Creative People and Places (CPP) on December 4, which gave the members of the Billericay Voices community a chance to meet with Lizzie and hear all about FLAGs.  A face-to-face meeting will be scheduled in the New Year, however, December was an opportunity to chat to Lizzie while she is at the beginning of her project, and Stephen and Peter took part along with a small number of other Billericay Voices members.

How does it work?

After a brief opportunity for the members to reveal what creative work they have been involved in recently, Lizzie introduced herself as a mother of three who, although not having been to Art School, started painting in the pandemic lockdown and has gone on to exhibit in local art shows and Galleries.  “I am really excited about this commission” she said, and plans to create 6-7 FLAGs, which are all glass fronted display cabinets in various styles, along Billericay High Street and in The Fold.  

The theme of the FLAGs is Leave Art, Take Art, Love Art.  People can leave a piece of art in the gallery, and if somebody likes a piece, they just take it, and hopefully will love it.

A Great Success

A pilot FLAG has been installed in The Meadoway, and has been a great success with at least 56 pieces of art being placed in the gallery and many appealed to residents so much that they were removed, to be replaced by other items.

Likely locations of the FLAGS are the existing Meadoway, the Fold, Library, human kind café, Cater Museum, Reading Rooms with negotiations continuing with one or more sites.  Most will be inside, but some such as the Reading Rooms and Cater Museum may be outside for better access.

The FLAGs vary in size ranging from full shelves in the Humankind café to an approximately 12” cube, a shallow display cabinet under a foot wide, and purchased cabinets, but are all small, requiring artists to create Mini paintings or 3D works.  

The Galleries will be accompanied by a series of free community art workshops in which all generations can take part, most of which will be open to all, to help local people create artworks for the galleries.  The workshops will be in the human kind cafe, The Fold, The Chantry Centre, Emmanuel Church and The Reading Rooms, and the main themes will be Views of Billericay, Billericay Scenes and Landmarks.  Peter Greene has provided photographs for use as "starters" for some of the workshops and advised on potential other sources on images.

The trail will be publicized with a map of the sites and a leaflet about the project and its operation.  There will also be Instagram and Facebook postings, with a hashtag of #BillericayArtTrail..