Gothenburg’s main avenue is being refurbished! Artists can now bid for the commission to produce a proposal for new public art along Avenyn. Submit your tender by 10 March 2023.
Here is a unique opportunity for artists to make their mark on one of Sweden’s best-known streets – Avenyn in Gothenburg. The commission involves producing a proposal for public art that is integrated with the location, in collaboration with architects and other stakeholders.
The public procurement also includes an option, which is the possibility of a contract for realisation and production of the public art project.
The ambition is for art to add further aesthetic and artistic value to the architecture and to the location as a whole.
The location
Kungsportsavenyen, popularly known as Avenyn (the Avenue), was laid out towards the end of the 19th century as an elegant promenade, bordered by grand residential buildings and trees.
Today the street is one of Sweden’s most famous, with plenty of shops, hotels, nightclubs, pavement cafés and restaurants that keep it busy throughout the day and night. The street has traffic lanes for cars as well as public transport and bicycles, and pavements for pedestrians. In addition to the many locals, around eight million tourists visit Avenyn every year.
An urban development project is now underway which includes refurbishments of Avenyn and Götaplatsen, the square from which it descends through central Gothenburg. The ambition is to create opportunities for different sorts of experiences for a variety of target groups. Measures include climate adaptation of the whole area in order to increase biodiversity as well as making the urban space safe, attractive and accessible, with more recreation venues.
In 2022 Nyréns Arkitektkontor won a design contest for Avenyn with its proposal AveNy. The artist who is awarded the commission to produce a proposal for new public art on Avenyn will be collaborating with Nyréns and other stakeholders.
The artistic commission
- The commission is to produce a proposal for a new public art for Avenyn, in collaboration with Nyréns Arkitektkontor and other stakeholders.
- The commission includes making an analysis of Avenyn from an artistic perspective. This analysis must relate to the larger context, such as the character and values of the area, and the activities carried out there.
- The public art must set out from the context and conditions of the place and its architecture, and contribute to creating dynamic and qualitative living spaces.
- The public art must be integrated with other features and characteristics of the place, which may involve interventions or impacts in several different parts of the urban space. The commission includes suggesting where the art can be integrated.
- The public art must invite new experiences of the location and allow for unexpected interpretations.
- The procurement includes an option, which is the possibility of a contract for realisation and production of the public art project. If this option is activated, the commission will preliminarily extend from 2024 until 2026.
A full description of the commission is available in TendSign, where you also submit your tender.
Compensation
The artist’s budget for the proposal is SEK 200,000, excluding VAT. You will not be compensated for submitting a tender.
If the option is activated, the artist’s budget for production of the public art project will be SEK 5,000,000, excluding VAT.
Qualifications
- In order to apply for this commission you have to be a professionally active artist. In this context “professionally active” means having a degree from an artistic higher education programme of at least five years, or an equivalent qualification.
- You should have experience of and interest in collaborating with other parties in your projects and your processes. This means that you need to possess strong artistic integrity in order to be able to collaborate and maintain a dialogue with the other involved parties, while at the same time remaining true to your art and expression.
- You should have the ability to engage with large spatial contexts. It is an additional qualification if your artistic work shows an interest in alternative ways of perceiving our built environments, e g by exploring norms, daily actions or patterns of behaviour in an urban setting.
- You need to have a good knowledge of materials and the ability to express your ideas using materials suited for public spaces.
About the Procurement
The procurement will be carried out as an Open Procedure in accordance with the Public Procurement Act (Lagen om Offentlig Upphandling, LOU). Artists must first submit a tender for the proposal commission. Evaluation of the tenders will be carried out in several steps. During this process between three and five artists will be called to interviews, which will take place on 27 and 28 March 2023. One artist will then be awarded the commission.
The one percent rule
The art project is financed by the one per cent rule. This rule stipulates that construction projects by companies and administrations in the City of Gothenburg must set aside at least one per cent of their construction cost for art. It applies to all projects of new construction, conversion and extension.
The urban development project for Avenyn and Götaplatsen is financed by the City of Gothenburg together with private property owners, with all parties all together having set aside close to two per cent of construction costs for art. The commissioner for the public art project for Avenyn is Stadsmiljöförvaltningen, the Urban Environment Department, in the City of Gothenburg.
Submitting a Tender
You submit your tender via TendSign. You have to provide a CV, an artist statement, a description of you motivation for applying, and a portfolio. You can find complete information about the commission in TendSign, as well as about how you submit a tender and how the evaluation process is carried out.
In order to submit a tender you need to create an account in tendsign.com. This is free of charge.
- Read the complete information about the commission and about submitting a tender in the tender document entitled Commission for proposing new public art on Avenyn (pdf, in Swedish)
- Link to the procurement
Your tender must be written in Swedish, Danish, Norwegian or English. Please note that the procurement will be carried out in Swedish, which means that all information and dialogues will be in Swedish. Thus applicants need to be able to understand – or have access to reliable translation of – written and spoken Swedish.
Deadline for submitting tenders
Submit your tender before midnight on 10 March 2023.
Questions
The procurement will be carried out using a public procurement procedure, to ensure that all applicants receive the same information. We are therefore unable to answer any questions via email or phone. Your questions have to be asked directly in TendSign, where all questions received and answers provided will be published, as well as any additional information.
The final date for asking questions in TendSign is 28 February 2023. Answers will be published by 3 March 2023.