1479 Plates by Chris Tipping
The results of a recent public artworks commission by Chris Tipping go on show at The Octagon in Bath (until 18 November)
The commission, called 1479 Plates, was made to mark the end of a ten-year project to save Combe Down, a village built over a shallow limestone mine. The mine has now been completely filled in and a series of public artworks have been commissioned to celebrate this extraordinary feat of engineering. Tipping’s installation of 1479 bone china plates, which together work as a multi-layered map of the mines, was inspired by their history. Combe Down stone was used to build much of 18th-century Bath by entrepreneur Ralph Allen and Tipping – who originally trained as a ceramist – saw parallels between Allen’s influence and Josiah Wedgwood’s achievements in Stoke. ‘I felt they both shared a spirit of enlightenment and interest in industry,’ he says. He also wanted to work with ceramics as a lot of broken blue and white china was found in the mine: ‘I was interested in re-making the broken plates and the patterns on my plates were suggested by those found in the mine,’ he explains.
Two sets of the 1479 plates have been made. The first will eventually go on permanent show in a Legacy Centre in the village, while the second will be given to each household within the mine area. ‘The plates tell the story of what happens beneath each house and this is a way of handing back the mines to the village’, says Tipping.
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