Engaging the St Albans community in the future management of their green space
Green Heart Partnership - St Albans District Council
During 2006, St Albans District Council worked with artist, Sanchita Islam, to creatively consult with the community about their perceptions of Clarence Park, a traditional Victorian Park, in order to inform the development of its Management Plan.
This project aimed to bring together the cross-departmental working group to work with a digital media artist to capture the community’s knowledge and perception of the park, and the ways in which they currently use, and would like to use, the park in the future.
Having gained Green Flag status in 2005, St Albans District Council had listened carefully to the judges comments about the need to better engage the community in the park’s management, and was looking for ways in which to achieve this.
St Albans District Council brought together a team of officers to work with GHP and community artist/ film-maker, Sanchita Islam, to more effectively reach the whole community of users and non-users of Clarence Park than is usually possible through traditional methods.
Sanchita worked as artist in residence in the park over two months, interviewing, filming, recording and photographing local people. She captured in a short DVD both user and non-user perceptions of Clarence Park, which were used to inform officers' decisions about future changes to be incorporated into the management plan.
It is hoped that this piece of work may encourage more people to become more involved in the park, through its Park Forum, or other consultative mechanisms which may be more appropriate.
The DVD and an accompanying report will form a section of the revised Management Plan submitted to Green Flag judges in order to apply for retention of this quality mark.
Start date: 1 August 2006
End date: 31 December 2006
Parent Project:
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More information
Documents
Art forms
- Film / Video
Themes
- Urban communities
- Urban development
Interventions
- New ways of working with LAs
- Artists' residencies
Target groups
- Arts development workers
- BME communities
Venue
- Hertfordshire