Gather is a community-engaged public artwork integrated into twenty-one concrete benches at Kingsway and Earles Street in Vancouver’s Norquay Village. Composed of thousands of custom glass mosaic triangles, the artwork draws together observations of the local natural world with patterns created by people who live, work, learn, and gather in the neighbourhood.
The project began by inviting residents to identify plants, birds, insects, fungi, and natural colours they noticed around them. These observations were combined with local research to develop a palette of twelve colours drawn from the neighbourhood.
A custom equilateral triangular tile became the building block for the project: a simple geometric form capable of generating an almost endless variety of patterns.
Through a series of community workshops, students, seniors, families, and local residents used the twelve-colour palette to create more than 600 individual geometric patterns.
Through a series of community workshops, students, seniors, families, and local residents used the twelve-colour palette to create more than 600 individual geometric patterns.
Back in the studio, these contributions were collected, organized and reorganized, then woven together into a continuous composition spanning all twenty-one benches. Individual gestures remain visible within the larger whole, creating a shared visual language shaped by many hands.
The triangular glass mosaic pieces were custom fabricated locally by Interstyle Glass, then individually assembled by hand into hundreds of panels before installation.
Now embedded within an everyday place for sitting, waiting, meeting, and passing through, Gather reflects the relationships between people, place, and the natural world.
Credits
Artist: Rebecca Bayer
Client: Peterson
Public Art Consultant: Ballard Fine Art
Landscape Architecture: Hapa Collaborative
Custom Glass Mosaic: Interstyle Glass
Mosaic Installation: iTile (Jorge Aguilar + assistant Garth)
Mosaic Assembly: Sunny Liu, Tara Yavari, Sarah Robinson, Anastasia Simonovich
Community Participants: With gratitude to the students, seniors, families, and residents who contributed more than 600 patterns through community workshops at Three Links Care Centre, Norquay Elementary School, Windermere Secondary School, Slocan Park Hall, and Norquay Park Fieldhouse / Fresh Roots.
Artist: Rebecca Bayer
Client: Peterson
Public Art Consultant: Ballard Fine Art
Landscape Architecture: Hapa Collaborative
Custom Glass Mosaic: Interstyle Glass
Mosaic Installation: iTile (Jorge Aguilar + assistant Garth)
Mosaic Assembly: Sunny Liu, Tara Yavari, Sarah Robinson, Anastasia Simonovich
Community Participants: With gratitude to the students, seniors, families, and residents who contributed more than 600 patterns through community workshops at Three Links Care Centre, Norquay Elementary School, Windermere Secondary School, Slocan Park Hall, and Norquay Park Fieldhouse / Fresh Roots.