Tate Liverpool repurposes gallery fixtures in new community collaboration

Unwanted but useful materials removed from Tate Liverpool ahead of its multi-million-pound renovation are being redistributed and reused in a project embracing some of the city’s community organisations and spaces.

London-based design group RESOLVE Collective is working with a series of community organisations across the city and beyond including Homebaked, Pagoda Arts and Sefton’s Rule of Threes.

Now some of those collaborations and organisations are being highlighted and celebrated in a free interactive exhibition at RIBA North’s Mann Island site – Tate Liverpool’s base while its nearby galleries are closed.

You Get a Car [Everybody Gets a Car]: RESOLVE Collective is at RIBA North until mid-July.

The project includes designing and constructing fit outs in some community spaces, donating specific material depending on organisational needs, and organising giveaway events at partner organisations and libraries to distribute useful items from Tate Liverpool across their communities.

Above: You Get a Car [Everybody Gets a Car]: RESOLVE Collective gallery of images.

Among the items being given away or repurposed are metal staff lockers, exhibition building materials, shelving, unwanted audio-visual and other appliances and café furniture. Tate’s art handlers have been a key part of the project.

The exhibition features work created by community groups and an ‘emotional mapping’ project carried out in collaboration with Tate staff, along with videos created by Liverpool film-maker Darren Brady and featuring members of the community organisations which show each group sharing stories and talking about their work within the communities they serve.

Along with Homebaked, Pagoda Arts and Rule of Three, they also include Aspen Yard and Liverpool Tool Library in Toxteth, Kitty’s Launderette, DoES in Islington, Stoneycroft Secret Garden, Squash Liverpool and the Chopping Club which meets in Sefton libraries.

Above: The Chopping Club in Sefton is one of the organisations working with RESOLVE Collective. Photo © Tate (Jashan Walton)

RESOLVE is an interdisciplinary design collective that combines architecture, engineering, technology and art to address social challenges. It has delivered numerous projects, workshops, publications and talks in the UK and across the world which look towards realising just and equitable visions of change in our built environment.

This is its first project in Liverpool. The title references a well-known quote from a 2004 episode of Oprah Winfrey's TV show where she gifted every member of the audience a vehicle.

Tate Liverpool’s Royal Albert Dock site is currently closed for a £29.7m ‘reimagining’ which will include a more visible and welcoming façade and opening up the ground floor to create a new ‘Art Hall’, along with more environmentally sustainable ventilation and heating systems and improved facilities for families, schools and community groups. It is due to reopen in 2025.

You Get a Car [Everybody Gets a Car]: RESOLVE Collective is at RIBA North on Mann Island until July.