Viva Brighton Issue #45 November 2016
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ART<br />
....................................<br />
Focus on: i360<br />
by Lisa Holdcroft<br />
150 drawings... and counting<br />
I started drawing last May - at that point the site<br />
was just a big square hole in the ground. I had been<br />
speaking to somebody about how big the i360 was<br />
going to be for the city - it’ll be a piece of <strong>Brighton</strong>’s<br />
history - so I knew I wanted to do something.<br />
I would go down there on my bike and sketch and<br />
take photos, then go back home and draw. I wanted<br />
to show the construction from the point of view of<br />
a spectator, rather than being a part of it.<br />
I posted one of my drawings on the i360 Facebook<br />
page and I got a response from David and<br />
Julia [the architects]. When they were putting in<br />
the ‘cans’, as they call them, each one was slightly<br />
different and they had to go together in a particular<br />
sequence. They gave me some of the architectural<br />
drawings and said, ‘you might want to take a look<br />
at these’. After a while I became a real trainspottertype<br />
geek. I read all the information on the i360<br />
website, and I had a contact there who I could speak<br />
to if I had any questions.<br />
Each item in the narrative has its own character<br />
and colour. It’s like building a visual language:<br />
this is how the sand is drawn, every time, and this<br />
is how the cans are drawn, every time. Using a limited<br />
range of colours sort of leads your eye through<br />
what’s going on. The good thing about drawing the<br />
i360 is that you can look at it from lots of different<br />
angles, and you only have the sea as a backdrop.<br />
The most exciting bit for me was when they<br />
were building the jacking tower - the square<br />
frame which housed the jacks. At the bottom the<br />
tower was lifted up, so that the next can could be<br />
stacked underneath. Then, on the top level, the<br />
aluminium coating went on to protect it from the<br />
wind. It was the first time this system had been tried<br />
anywhere in the world.<br />
I’ve done over 150 drawings so far. When I actually<br />
went on the i360 when it opened I was a bit<br />
overwhelmed, because I’d spent so long drawing it.<br />
I am going to draw it from the inside eventually; I<br />
want to finish the series with the views from the top<br />
- that is the point of the whole thing!<br />
As told to Rebecca Cunningham<br />
lisaholdcroft.com<br />
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