NISSAN Ireland is to sponsor a £40,000 public art project in association with the Irish Museum of Modern Art. The first Nissan Art Project will be temporary and will occupy a Dublin city centre site all next summer.
At a reception to announce the sponsorship yesterday at IMMA, the museum's director, Mr Declan McGonagle, explained that he did not see the temporary nature of the art work as a disadvantage, as it will aid experimentation, and the technical difficulties of finding permanent sites will be avoided. He added. "It is not part of our job as a museum to commission public sculpture for the city."
Nissan Ireland has a strong record in the sponsorship of sports events and recently saved the 1998 World Equestrian Games for Ireland with sponsorship in the region of £2 million. This however, is its first arts sponsorship. "It is," said Mr McGonagle, "very unusual to get permanent funding for temporary projects. It is very unusual to get sponsorship to experiment."
Visual artists working in any medium will be asked to submit proposals from September until December 1st. The submissions will be assessed by a panel including Ms Sandra Percival, Director of the Public Art Development Trust, London, and the Tokyo curator, Mr Fumio Nanjo.
A number of proposals will be selected for further development, and a final selection will be made in March. The art work will be completed by early summer and the £40,000 fund will cover materials and the artist's fee.
Speaking at the reception, Mr Gerard O'Toole, chairman of Nissan Ireland, confirmed it was envisaged that the Nissan Art Project might run annually "to the millennium" if it proved successful.