The structural change from work to culture is clearly manifested by the present character of the Albert Dock in Liverpool: this former trade center for luxury goods and work has now for some time functioned as a museum quarter.

In the mid-eighties, when work on rebuilding the Albert Dock began, sceptical Liverpool residents saw this flagship project of urban renewal as a »Trojan horse« that the conservative goverment was going to use to take this recalcitrant workers' bastion of the North.¹ The docks were without doubt a sensitive area, and symbolized the city's trauma: once a visible expression of the city's wealth and spirit of innovation, by the beginning of the eighties they were in an advanced state of decay. In view of the massive deindustrialization, unemployment, and large numbers of people moving away from the city, many Liverpudlians were unconvinced by their conversion into an island of culture.

Now, the Albert Dock is seen as a symbol of the city. It is indisputable that the »reinvention« of the Albert Dock has contributed to improving Liverpool's image. Moreover, the waterfront, a former center of activity, has also been reclaimed and revitalized along with the Dock. The sober, functional esthetics of Jesse Hartley from 1846 have been retained, while a colonnade creates harmony between the impressive red-brick warehouses and connects the museum with the numerous cafés, restaurants and shops. Admittedly, there are varying strategies of presentation and marketing at work here: while the Beatles Museum continues to work on what is probably the city's most famous identity-creating mythos, the Maritime Museum (1984) takes its location as an opportunity to offer a counterbalance to the city's loss of history and identity. In particular, the departments »Emigrants to a New World« and the »Transatlantic Slavery Gallery« (opened 1993) undertake and stimulate an examination of central topoi in Liverpool's history – and thus those belonging to a goodly part of British and European history, too.² Tate Liverpool, on the other hand, devotes itself to contemporary art.

[b]Expectations and Disappointments[/b]

The architects James Stirling, Michael Wilfort and Associates have designed the entrance in striking bright orange and blue. This art gallery, completed in 1988 (and extended and altered in 1998), was the start of an expansive project over the last decade, a project that has obviously met with success: the opening of Tate Liverpool was followed by that of the St. Ives Tate Gallery (1993) and Tate Modern in London (2000). The establishment of the Tate in Liverpool was the realization of an original idea of Sir Henry Tate, an art collector and sugar magnate.³

When visitors enter the foyer, they can already see into the exhibition on the ground floor. This small room, which is devoted mainly to individual exhibitions by young artists, has more the atmosphere of a street gallery than of an official art gallery. Visitors are drawn in as if on an off chance. The principle of free admission also objectively relativizes any commercial or touristic intention to some extent.

On the first floor there is the semi-permanent exhibition of Tate Liverpool: Modern British Art (National Collection). For this exhibition, new art works are bought every year. In addition, objects from other Tate galleries are shown together with those from the Tate Liverpool collection in new thematic combinations. The present selection offers representative insights into the themes of 20th century British art: for example, »Flesh and Blood« shows themes of the nineties – bodies and individuals form points of reference for art works by artists such as Helen Chadwick or Mona Hatoum.

On the top floor of the former warehouse, changing exhibitions of international art are displayed. Between the pictures, the circular gallery provides frequent views of the Mersey River, the sea in the background or the dock basin with the city behind it – an ideal context for an exhibition like »At Sea,« which recently ended.⁴ This exhibition showed how this theme seems to be a source of unending fascination and inspiration even for contemporary artists (Tacita Dean, Rineke Dijkstra, Tracey Emin, Mariele Neudecker, Martin Parr and Hiroshi Sugimoto among others). According to Hiroshi Sugimoto, this is because the view from land out to the wide sea offers a virtually constant element in our rapidly changing world.⁵

It took some time for Tate Liverpool to be accepted in its function as an art gallery. People had expectations of widely differing kinds. For example, representatives of the black community art scene in Liverpool, who saw the colonial history of Liverpool as being bound up on an exemplary level with the history of the Tate, were disappointed when their ideas for a critical examination of this theme met with no approval: they claim that this is doubly cynical in view of the fact that the Tate absorbs money – indirectly, via the city council – that only began to flow because of the social situation in Toxteth (one of the most desolate districts in the EU), which is inhabited almost exclusively by blacks.⁶

[b]Criticism from within[/b]

Although critical disclosures of this sort do not seem to fit into the Tate's concept, there have been efforts to cross boundaries in this direction, whether with projects that include the local population in various ways, or with artistic interactions that allow criticism of the art institution from within to become public. For example, in »Looking Both Ways,« an exhibition that took place during the gallery's first years, collective perceptions and experiences of city residents and visitors were included. Two current exhibitions also integrate various groups within the population: In »Primary Vision« (until October 2001), childrens' pictures created at a Liverpool school are shown next to Klee and Dubuffet. A reponse to »At Sea« in the form of a sound collage is being worked on by older people. The Young Tate Initiative is also worthy of mention: a group of young people to which the Tate gives artistic guidance and partly curates.

Projects like that of Stephen Willats are carried out on a different categorical level. His work »Museum Mosaic,« which he created for the Tate in 1994, can be seen as a subversive countermodel to an object-centred art gallery. A traditional understanding of the art institution is called into question from within. In »Museum Mosaic,« therefore, the interactive behavior and the creativity of the vistors was planned into the art project from the start. The gallery itself was used only as a walk-through space, as a mosaic tile, since the artist deliberately created a link to other, non-artistic institutions in the city.⁷

Today there is consensus about the role of Tate Liverpool in the context of urban regeneration. The term »regeneration« takes into account a process that transcends the model of »renewal.« Art and culture take on a central function as catalyzers.⁸ In this regard, a massive influence of the Tate on the Liverpool art scene has been noticed. The regenerating influence affects various levels: for example, numerous small galleries and independent studios have come into existence in the particularly neglected districts between the Albert Dock and the center of the city since 1988, something which has strengthened the local scene network. Today, people speak of a »creative quarter.«⁹ In their revitalized state, these districts gained in appeal and attracted new residents. However, people in the art scene have warned that the dangers of the »SoHo effect«¹⁰ can only be avoided in Liverpool if the city fathers have the political will to give structural support to small independent initiatives instead of putting them through the free-market grinder when their work is done.

 

Translated by Tim Jones

 

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