Annie Lennox supports initiative to rescue Aberdeen Union Terrace Gardens
In one of her two blog posts so far today (here’s the second one) Annie Lennox reponded to a post in her official forum (see here or on MySpace) regarding the Aberdeen Union Terrace Gardens in Annie Lennox’s hometown.
She is calling her fans to save the new Contemporary Art Centre in Union Terrace Gardens by signing an online petiton.
Read the original forum post first:
Aberdeen Union Terrace Gardens to be Lost
by lowball » Sun Feb 07, 2010 11:50 am
Annie’s Home City has a plan to have a fantastic New Peacock Arts Centre in Union Terrace Gardens. The plans costing about 13m have planning permission & everthing was set to go until Sir Ian Wood has come up with a plan to concrete over the gardens create a car park, shops & a civic square ontop the size of Red Square in Moscow
The peoples park just handed over to the business community & a current public consultation costing 1m WITHOUT the inclusion if Peacock Artspace as part of the process. Ian Wood has offered 50m of his own money but the public purse has to find 90m +++extras.
Any civilised city retain its green space & has a thriving arts scene but the business community are trying to hijack this for their own ends. Its a horrible bland plan & will end up with all the deciduous trees some of which are near 200 years old being cut down.
The citizens are furious, please help let Annie know about this & if possible check the letters page of The Press & Journal & the petitions of which there are 6000 against the concreting over.
Here’s Annie’s reaction (from her forum)
Actually, make that 6000 and 1!…Here’s my take on this.
Aberdeen was my home town. I was born there, and lived in the city until I was seventeen.
For me, Union Terrace Gardens was, and still is the green historical heart of the city. Like so many towns and cities all over the country, Aberdeen lost a great deal of it’s architectural heritage and charm through destruction by bulldozer and concrete. It made me sad then, and it still makes me sad. I hoped that this kind of “vandalism” had peaked in the 60’s and 70’s, but for Aberdeen, it seems to be back with vengeance. What idiocy and madness. I’ve been based in London since 1971, so I guess that kind of counts my voice out..but, to the citizens of Aberdeen I would say this…
“Aberdeen is your home town. Are you going to sit back, and do nothing while it’s beautiful historic center gets ripped out and concreted over”??!!
It’s down to you to stop this happening.
Best wishes from Annie
Click here to sign the petition to save the Gardens & The New Peacock Artspace project.
UPDATE, 7pm:
The BBC just published a news article including already a reply by ACSEF chairman Tom Smith to Annie’s blog post:
“Peacock Visual Arts say the two projects could co-exist.
Given that Ms Lennox appears to have made her comments based on a wholly inaccurate description of the project on Myspace, we are hardly surprised by them. Acsef has repeatedly stated that the City Square project aims to create a new civic space and gardens with an iconic arts centre as its centrepiece.
The claims by objectors that it will be a flat, concrete square similar to Red Square are as misleading as their statement that it will be full of shops and car-parking. We will be happy to show Ms Lennox our proposals so she has these facts.”
You find the full BBC News article here.
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