Fredericton Construction Zone Transformed Into An Outdoor Art Exhibit
FREDERICTON — Besides 30-degree heat, summer means the start of construction season. This year, Downtown Fredericton Inc. wants to make the construction zone on Regent Street an attraction rather than a deterrent.
“On the Fence” is an outdoor art exhibit on Regent Street showcasing the works of local artists.
“Leading into the construction we’ve been working with the businesses and with the city just to try to make sure everybody’s aware of what’s happening with the construction,” said Krista Rae, marketing and communications coordinator for Downtown Fredericton.
Rae said that in the middle of a construction zone, people often shy away and are unsure if they can go into businesses. To prevent that in past years, the city has placed signage assuring passersby that restaurants and stores are still open.
“We wanted to take it a step further knowing that this one block of Regent Street would be affected for the whole summer,” said Rae.
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The idea of an outdoor art exhibit came about when talking about the strong art scene in Frederiction. They recruited the help of local artist Laura Forrester, one of the founders of the Capital Art Sale. Laura sent out a call to artists in the area and gathered around 80 works of art.
The committee held a blind jury to get the selection down to 40 pieces. From there, Laura helped to digitize the portraits and sent panels to a local printer. Laura also helped to create scannable QR codes found on the bottom right of each piece.
“Those QR codes are unique to each of the artists that are featured and will take you to either their website or social media of their choice,” said Rae.
People who are interested can find out more about the artist and see what they currently have available. Rae said it is great for the artists to be displayed in public for the summer. She has seen many shares and positive comments from artists online.
“We do hope that this encourages the public to come to that block and experience the art and have a look and see what our local artists are doing right now,” said Rae.
When installing the artwork last week, Rae said that business owners and passersby came up to share their appreciation.
“Since [the art has] gone up there has just been a buzz around that block,” said Rae.
Rae said that due to the rise in Covid numbers in the last few weeks in Fredericton people may be wary to go out and into businesses.
“Anything we can do to help these businesses is appreciated,” said Rae. “So I think the response from businesses has been very positive. They are really excited to see it.”
The artwork will be up until the end of construction which is scheduled for the end of August.
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Rachel Smith is a summer intern for Huddle. Send her story suggestions: [email protected].