The Cable Street Mural: Public Artworks for our Past and Future
In the first episode of the Open City Podcast (which launches today!) hosts Merlin Fulcher and Selasi Setufe speak to Paul Butler, one of the artists who created the Cable Street Mural commemorating the Battle of Cable Street. It’s a remarkable artistic achievement and very much worth a visit - but it is also something that has always had to fight for its existence.
The episode focuses specifically on the creation of the mural, its ongoing maintenance, and what it tells us about the role such artworks play in our ever-changing understanding of history. In advance of its launch, Zoë Cave spoke to Paul about his views on public art, collective work and the role of education in promoting community-focused projects.
ZC In your view, what does public art do to open the city?
PB As the UK is privatised, corporatised and homogenised, the arts is one of the few means of expression left to us. In the city we are faced with the hard rectilinear surfaces of corporate capitalism, whilst public art offers the possibility of creating anomalous, unexpected, special places. Public art creates images, objects and spaces for the people, by the people, which belong to the people, but the creation of these spaces is not easy. They come about through a difficult and often problematic process of negotiation, argument and struggle as all the accumulated tangles of histories spaces, sites, buildings, occupations, people and stories are unraveled. The site created at the end of it, which refers to history, acquires a history of its own, continuing to evolve over time as events overtake it and readings of it change.
The Cable Street mural is not simply a huge image on a wall, it is a dynamic site and a place of pilgrimage. Only a couple of days ago there were demonstrations and speeches there. The ripples spread outwards – it provides the focus for educational projects, film and tv documentaries, interviews, discussions, debate, performance, demonstrations, speeches, drama, music. So could the Grenfell site.
All art needs to be out there. Increasingly artists see the totality of the environment as the social and physical space in which they operate. Many contemporary galleries have become shops for the super-rich. Of course the big public galleries and smaller artist-led spaces remain vital sites which keep discourse alive, but they can also be myopic and complacent – either full of those comfortable people from an extremely narrow demographic, or empty.
Art and artists can cut through the prevailing orthodoxy, stir the people up, and shake the ‘authorities’ out of their static conventionality. Art can be the catalyst that makes something happen.
ZC Much of how history is recorded focuses on narratives of individuals and this is reflected in the monuments in our cities. Cable Street mural is a portrayal of a collective. Do you think this is significant? Is there something to learn from this?
PB The Cable Street mural demonstrates the power of collective action - and of determination, tenacity and extremely hard work. The word Community tends to evoke a nostalgic idea of ‘the people’ as a kind of homogenised group. The reality is that realising a big project is problematic and you need to create a coalition of interested parties: local residents, the local authority, funding bodies, political groups and not least, artists.
This coalition represents – is – the community, and it should be non-hierarchical. All voices should be heard, including the voice of the artist. The artist is the entrepreneur who does not recognise the limitations of convention - whose vision and mentality makes unexpected connections and acts as the catalyst in the mix. They are there to cut through the bureaucracy and retain the vision.
ZC Apart from Cable Street, are there any other murals/public art/monument you think people should know more about? What other themes, places or topics would you like to see talked about in the podcast?
PB I believe that one of the biggest problems we face as a culture is the failure of education. Learning need not take place within these well-intentioned but repressive institutions called schools - it can take place anywhere that people congregate. The deepest learning takes place when a bunch of people come together and build a boat, take it to the water and sail it; or research and paint a mural; or build a hydrogen powered vehicle; or create a choir and sing together.
We have a lot to learn when it comes to delivering projects that benefit the community, so my suggestion for a future subject for discussion is the creation of arts, education and employment hubs open to all. The hubs would explore ways of initiating these types of projects as well as finding ways to generate income and employment, then find suitable spaces and initiate, create and run the programme within them, with one of the primary purposes being learning.
To hear more from Paul about the Cable Street Mural, listen to the Open City Podcast episode launching on Monday 24th August.
Subscribe on Soundcloud, Apple Podcasts or Spotify to keep up to date, or check out open-city.org.uk/podcast for more information!