Location: Queensway Tunnel - Mersey Tunnel
As part of Merseytravel's Public Art Strategy and the re-development within the Queensway Tunnel of the cladding wall panels. Merseytravel offered students a one off, unique opportunity to re-design the skylines for both the Wirral and Liverpool with the chosen designs going on to be reproduced onto vitreous enamel coated ceramic cladding panels which will sit at either end of the tunnel and become a permanent representation of both the Wirral and Liverpool for travelling commuters and visitors to the area with a captive audience of over 10.2 million vehicles per year using the Queensway Tunnel.
The aim of the competition was to design a contemporary skyline that best represents and celebrates the individuality of both the Wirral and Liverpool, taking into consideration what both districts are recognised or remembered for. We asked that the image be clear, defining and a cutting edge design portraying the districts in a positive manner.
Judging of the competition took place back in February 2011, the chosen designs were created by part-time student, Alison Barker, who studied at Liverpool Community College.
Alison Barker was born in Yorkshire and trained as a pharmacist before moving to live and work in Merseyside in 1995. She is keen musician, playing both violin and viola. Alison enjoys painting in acrylics, producing abstract works such as geometric representations of cities. It was in 2011 whilst she was studying Art and Design at Liverpool Community College, that she developed her own musical colour scale, each note being represented by a different colour. Whilst listening to or reading music she 'sees' it in colour (known as synaesthesia). She has produced abstract paintings using her colour scale to represent pieces of music.
Interpretation of Alison's designs are detailed below:-
For Liverpool Composition she has depicted the major buildings of the Liverpool cityscape, based on her own photographs from Seacombe. The height of each building corresponds to a note on a musical stave, which in turn gives each building its colour from Ali's own colour scale. The keyboard below alludes to the significance of music in both the design and in Liverpool life.
For Wirral Composition follows the same process, condensing the notable buildings from a long stretch of Wirral, but including Lady Lever Art Gallery, which isn't visible from Liverpool. In Wirral Composition the colour green, rather than representing one of the notes of the scale is used to show the green landscape of Wirral seen from Liverpool. Below the buildings is a musical stave, overlaid with a flowing, repeating design of the leaf of the bog myrtle, the plant that in Anglo-Saxon times was widespread across the peninsula and Wirral its name.