A Fair Share

When a museum shuts its doors for major renovation, the amount of material that usually goes to waste during its refurbishment is often overlooked. In advance of Tate Liverpool’s closing last autumn, we wanted to explore what we might be able to save from landfill. We invited RESOLVE Collective to assist us by thinking creatively about how to reuse some of these materials across Tate’s networks in the city of Liverpool.

RESOLVE is an interdisciplinary design collective that combines architecture, engineering, technology and art to address social challenges. They developed You Get a Car [Everybody Gets a Car], an experimental process of redistributing materials and knowledge from the currently closed Tate Liverpool. The project supports creative, community-focused projects in Liverpool for an environmentally sustainable, more circular economy.

In order to distribute material in different areas of the city, RESOLVE collaborated with community spaces to offer giveaway events for members of the public. The first giveaway took place over two days in January. It was organised together with Rule of Threes, an arts and environment organisation that runs a programme of artist-led projects in libraries in Sefton. RESOLVE brought a variety of items – from chairs and tables to audio-visual equipment – to Crosby Library, where local community organisations and people reclaimed them for free. Everything had to go – and everything did!

Alongside the giveaway, artists Niamh Riordan, Gregory Herbert and Linny Venables ran Chopping Club, a regular gathering that brings together locals, librarians, cooks, food producers and artists to prepare a meal together and exchange ideas about food.

The activities that took place over these two days embodied the shared ideals and purpose of Rule of Threes, Sefton Libraries, RESOLVE and Tate: namely, to rethink and expand the civic role of libraries and art organisations in our communities.

^{You Get a Car [Everybody Gets a Car], at Tate Liverpool + RIBA North until 14 July.}

^{Carine Harmand is The John Ellerman Foundation Curator, Tate Liverpool.}