Vancouver
MERGE (Lynnmour Sound Wall): Full Spectrum
On 25, Feb 2022 | In infrastructure, News, Project | By Admin
We took advantage of the beautiful February weather to go and see MERGE fully complete. This short video follows all 356m of the acoustic sound barrier that lies at the foot of Lynn Valley, between the Fern Street overpass and Lynnmour Creek along the newly reconfigured section of the Trans-Canada Highway (Hwy 1). The twenty naturalistic colours used in MERGE represent a selection of local flora, fauna and landmarks specific to the Lynnmour community and area.
@solidrockfencing
@KCIKraftConsultingInc
@NVanDistrict
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MERGE (2022) Rebecca Bayer, 356m x 4m, Powder-coated Aluminum Acoustic Panels,
Trans-Canada Highway @ Keith Road, Lynnmour, District of North Vancouver, territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations
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MERGE (Lynnmour Sound Wall) Update: BANANA SLUG
On 08, Dec 2021 | In infrastructure, Inspiration, News, Project | By Admin
MERGE features twenty colours representing a selection of local flora, fauna and landmarks specific to the Lynnmour community and Seymour River area, including the beloved Banana Slug.
One of our favourite images from the MERGE installation was taken by Jason Hardy from @solidrockfencing. Jason took this incredible photograph of an actual local Banana Slug sliding out from between panels in the Banana Slug segment just after they had been stored in a grassy area since the Spring.
Reconfiguring this section of Trans-Canada Highway (Hwy 1) is a large and complex undertaking and not without a one or two unforeseen challenges… such as the huge lamp post that was installed immediately in front of the ‘Banana Slug’ section!
Thanks to the friendly team at @solidrockfencing and @KCIKraftConsultingInc we were able to carefully reposition the Banana Slug panel and complete the 4m tall and 356m spectrum with the Banana Slug unobstructed 🙂
@solidrockfencing
@KCIKraftConsultingInc
@NVanDistrict
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MERGE (2021) Rebecca Bayer, 356m x 4m, Powder-coated Aluminum Acoustic Panels,
Trans-Canada Highway @ Keith Road, Lynnmour, District of North Vancouver, territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations
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MERGE (Lynnmour Sound Wall) Update: North Shore News
Many thanks to Brent Richter and Mike Wakefield from the North Shore News for this article about ‘MERGE’ #mergesoundwall.
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“For too long, it’s been a traffic jam through a construction site. But the bottom of The Cut is taking on a whole new look.
Artist Rebecca Bayer is putting the final touches on Merge, a 366-metre-long shock of colour stretching along Highway 1 between Mountain Highway and Fern Street.
It is one of the final pieces of the $200-million Lower Lynn Improvement Project, intended to shield the Inter River neighbourhood from highway noise. But it’s also now likely the largest single piece of public art on the North Shore.
“An acoustic barrier wall could be very mundane and boring, but my hope with the bright colours is that it is more interesting and vibrant from both sides. It can be experienced at a slow pace, but also a fairly quick pace if you’re driving along the highway, and it sort of blurs together as you drive by,” she said. “I get pretty excited by public art that really blends with the infrastructure or architecture, and it just becomes part of something that was already going to be there anyway.”
Bayer chose the 20 different colours specifically because they are found in the flora, fauna and landmarks from the Lynn Valley area. Bayer consulted with the Lynn Canyon Ecology Centre to match colours with individual species like the red-backed salamander, Pacific chorus frog and licorice fern. She then tried out different permutations to come up with the pattern that exists there today. “There is quite an amazing pocket of nature right there,” she said. “It made sense to try to work with the natural palette in some way.”
On the Inter River side, the names of the species appear on some panels, which Bayer said she hopes will enable Merge to educate as well as beautify.
Lori Phillips, the District of North Vancouver’s public art officer who helped in the selection process of Bayer for the project, said it does both. “Merge is a perfect example of the magic that can happen when artists are added to infrastructure projects. Suddenly a rather understated sound wall is transformed into a dynamic public artwork that is free and accessible for everyone to enjoy,” she said. “The District of North Vancouver’s public art program, was thrilled to partner with the [Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure] on this project and we know that the residents of Lynnmour, along with the thousands of daily commuters and travellers on Highway 1 will enjoy its masterful merge of colour and story, for years to come.”
Even as sound barriers/art canvasses go, the panels are a “world-class sound attenuation product” designed to neutralize sound, not just bounce it away from residences, said Mark Hersey, managing partner of Solid Rock Fencing, the company contracted to install the 623 panels.
Today, there are just a few gaps in the wall, which will be filled when the final panels arrive from Europe, Hersey said.
The final components of the Lower Lynn Improvement Project, including combining the Main Street and Dollarton Highway on-ramps into one with signalized traffic control, are expected to come online later this fall.”
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Special thanks on this project go out to:
Jay Porter, BC Transportation and Infrastructure
Erin Moxton, North Vancouver District
Lori Phillips, North Vancouver Recreation & Culture
Tamsin Guppy, Lynn Canyon Ecology Centre
Rainer Kraft, KCI Kraft Consulting Inc.
Mark Hersey and Jason Hardy, Solid Rock Fencing Ltd.
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MERGE (2021) Rebecca Bayer, 356m x 4m, Powder-coated Aluminum Acoustic Panels,
Trans-Canada Highway @ Keith Road, Lynnmour, District of North Vancouver, territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations
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More info:
http://www.spacemakeplace.com/portfolio/merge-lynnmour-sound-wall/
MERGE (Lynnmour Sound Wall) Update: Colourful Transformation
On 17, Sep 2021 | In infrastructure, Make, Place, Project | By Admin
It’s been another productive week at MERGE. We want to offer a special thanks to Mark Hersey, Jason Hardy and the team from Solid Rock Fencing for their special attention to detail and careful installation of the 623 colourful acoustic panels. This project is starting to transform the landscape and has already made a huge difference in reducing the traffic noise level in the neighbouring Lynnmour community.
It is all coming together very nicely and everyone is excited to see the wall complete in the next few weeks.
MERGE (Lynnmour Sound Wall – 2021), will feature twenty naturalistic colours which represent a selection of local flora, fauna and landmarks specific to the Lynnmour community and area. Merge stands at 4m tall and spans 356m along the newly reconfigured section of the Trans-Canada Highway (Hwy 1) between Ironworkers Memorial Second Narrows Crossing and Lynn Creek. The acoustic dampening, sound wall sits between the highway and the residential neighbourhood along Keith Road and is clad in colourful powder-coated aluminum panels. The panels have been carefully configured to produce a giant, site-specific spectrum designed to be viewed by both passing traffic and residents in nearby communities.
@solidrockfencing
@KCIKraftConsultingInc
@NVanDistrict
Whereness turns 5!
Spacemakeplace is celebrating five years since the installation of ‘Whereness’. Located near the Langara /49th Avenue Canada Line Station, ‘Whereness’ was commissioned by Mosaic Homes for the City of Vancouver Public Art Program in 2016.
‘Whereness’ provides a tactile link between the area’s geological past and its current condition. The bottom boulder of the sculpture is a granite glacial erratic, deposited at this address thousands of years ago as a huge ice sheet receded up the Fraser Valley. This very boulder was scanned and replicated six times, then stacked to form a visual puzzle.
The sculpture acknowledges the practice of piling rocks at certain points along pathways to guide travellers crossing the landscape. This simple custom is still common across cultures around the world.
MERGE (Lynnmour Sound Wall) Update: Waidhofen, Austria
On 11, Mar 2021 | In infrastructure, Make, News, Place, Project | By Admin
Thanks to FORSTER and Rainer Kraft from Kraft Consulting for their recent photos of the colourful acoustic panels that have now been fabricated at Forster’s factory in Waidhofen, Austria. Later this summer (2021) these panels will be installed along side 356m of Trans-Canada Highway (Hwy 1) between Ironworkers Memorial Second Narrows Crossing and Lynn Creek in the District of North Vancouver.
The public artwork, MERGE, will feature twenty naturalistic colours representing a selection of local flora, fauna and landmarks specific to the Lynnmour community and area. The ~620 powder-coated aluminum panels have been carefully configured to produce a giant site-specific spectrum designed to be viewed by both passing traffic and residents in nearby communities.
MERGE (Lynnmour Sound Wall) Panels: FORSTER. Waidhofen, Austria
MERGE (Lynnmour Sound Wall) Panels: FORSTER. Waidhofen, Austria
MERGE (Lynnmour Sound Wall) Panels: FORSTER. Waidhofen, Austria
MERGE (Lynnmour Sound Wall) Panels: FORSTER. Waidhofen, Austria
MERGE (Lynnmour Sound Wall) Panels: FORSTER. Waidhofen, Austria
New Project: Maple Ridge Community Mosaic
Thanks to the Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadow News for their recent article about our upcoming project at the renovated Maple Ridge Leisure Centre. We’re looking forward to the community workshop series with local groups this November.
Newly Planted: GIANT
We are very pleased to announce the recent installation of ‘Giant’, a 71’ tall artwork commissioned by PC Urban for the newly rebuilt Lightworks Building, located at 22 East 5th Avenue in Vancouver’s Mt. Pleasant neighbourhood.
At 71′ tall, ‘Giant’ represents a juvenile Douglas Fir tree, standing at the approximate height a real Douglas Fir might be in 2018, had it started from seed when the original Lightworks building was first built in 1942.
Our special thanks to Gerald Nimchuk and his great team at East Van Vinyl for their expert printing and precision installation. East Van Vinyl are located on 6th Avenue, only one block away from GIANT! Thank you also to Wade Girgulis, Project Manager at PC Urban and Jan Ballard and her team at Ballard Fine Art for this opportunity.
GIANT installation half way. The installation took place in two phases and took four days to complete.
On the doors at the main entrance to the Lightworks Building the GIANT image is fritted inside the glass panes for added protection
‘Whereness’ Installed!
WHERENESS, located at Cambie & 50th, Vancouver. More here. Happy to announce that the new public artwork ‘Whereness’ was successfully installed at the Cambria site in early August 2016. Landscaping at base coming soon.
CITY FABRIC Photoshoot
We had a fun morning photographing CITY FABRIC from a 125′ boom lift.
Thanks to United Rentals and the great team at GNW Scene Shop for their generous support and assistance!
CITY FABRIC is installed and open to the public under the south end of Vancouver’s Burrard Bridge from August 1 to September 30, 2015.
Fantasma @ Project Space
Fantasma Viaduct Prints
Project Space – Monthly Open Studio: Wir Bauen Eine Neue Stadt
Join Project Space for their Monthly Open Studio presentation of “Wir Bauen Eine Neue Stadt (We Build A New City),” an exhibition of photographic works based on themes of architecture and urbanism that features artwork by Rebecca Bayer, David Gregory and Ryan Ming. A special edition zine and series of postcards realized for the exhibition will be available.
“Fantasma” is a series by Rebecca Bayer and David Gregory that explores the potential of space beneath Vancouver’s viaduct infrastructure. These images layer a repeated silk-screened pattern, derived from the negative space surrounding the Dunsmuir Viaduct, over alternately processed photographs developed on rag paper.
“Moving on Up” is a series of photographs Ryan Ming has taken throughout Vancouver, documenting various forms of high-rise housing developments built in the 1960s and 70s. The images display an interchangeability in the appearance of raw concrete and geometrics that seem indistinguishable from postwar housing estates in Europe.
REBECCA BAYER is an artist and architectural designer whose work concentrates on ways people interact with the materiality of the city.
DAVID GREGORY is a photographer who focuses on Vancouver as both a subject and a backdrop, addressing ideas concerning public and private space.
RYAN MING is a Vancouver-based writer and artist. His photography examines themes of time, urban fragments and landscape documentation, utilizing a cinematographic approach.