A Collaborative project between UHC Collective and Art Gene exploring hidden assets around the coast of Barrow and its Islands in the context of regeneration.

Beauty Pageants

Since the supposed demise of co-operative municiple socialism at the hands of successive Conservative governments in the 80's and 90's, town and cities in the UK now compete fiercely with each other to attract inward investment. The big cities of the North led the way: Labour stronghold Manchester (where the artists collective Ultimate Holding Company are from) was perhaps the first council to end the consensus, closely followed by Liverpool and now Leeds and Sheffield.

What gets thrown-up by these tsunamis of economic regeneration are homogenised sterile public spaces and overinflated 'landmark' buildings, all swimming in a sea of coffee bars and buy-to-let apartments (that's rented flats to you and me). This is some planning department or foreign investor's idea of paradise. In fact the tacky attention seeking, jockeying for prizes - and unabashed showing-off - is no more than an embarrasing old-style beauty pageant. And not even a tasteful one - it's more like the one where the finanlists brawl on the floor over a fake diamond tiara.

The Swimwear Round

The knock-on effect of this circus is being felt in smaller towns like Barrow and has been going on for a while now: they feel the pressure to start competing under the same rules. Like teenage girls trying to look old enough to get into a club, Councillors hunt high and low for their town's 'unique selling points', historical soundbite or cultural real estate - usually with unimaginative results.

So Barrow isn't an easy sell. From an outsider's perspective, the perception is that Barrow is a small end-of-the-line industrial town with nuclear warts. A less than glamorous image. Even without competition from big cities, with Blackpool, Morecambe, the Isle of Man and the Lakes all visible (on a good day) from Barrow, there are obvious and unfavourable comparisons to the big tourist resorts.

Who Needs Them?

This is unmistakably paradise. And as with all beauty spots - it's right under our noses.

Why? Precisely because there are no coffee shop chains, yuppies, motorways, tacky gift shops and saturation levels of unrealistic posturing - yet. And this is a glorious and relatively unspoiled coastline. It'd peppered with real gems that are never going to be recognised as assets unless we got imaginative. But gems they are nonetheless. These places are remote and isolated from the town, away from the population and commutes, abandoned, vandalised and not traditionally 'touristy'. They range from odd-looking lighthouses to WW2 bunkers, sheds, towers, slag mountains, jetties, skeleton boats wrecks, reservoirs, ruined mills, new windfarms and derelict indstrial wastelands.

Focusing here is counterintuitive, but starting the search for potential assets to the town beyond the obvious gives Barrow an advantage, a bit of extra breadth to the profile. Its also risky, experimental, exciting. It throws a curved ball back at the other pageant contestants.

There is precedence and form to build on too: Barrow, in common with many small towns, has (and to an extent continues to) play fast and lose with it's natural and visual environment. To that extent no one needs to change the plan, just put a little good art and design into the mix.

Jai Redman: Creative Director UHC Collective


It's Not As Rough As It Used To Be

Since autumn 2008, UHC have been working on a major critical regeneration project, the first part of which was developed during their collaborative artist residency at Art Gene in Barrow-in-Furness.

The work is grouped under the title 'Its Not As Rough As It Used To Be' and has a number of strands: new 3D interventions in Google Earth, a series of outdoor public events along the coast and a gallery installation which premiered on 20th November. UHC's work also featured in Art Gene's recent exhibition 'Welcome To Paradise'.

For more in-depth information about 'It's Not As Rough As It Used To Be' and other projects by UHC Collective please click here, or view their Artist Page here.