The Westgate Cultural Meridian, Oxford was commissioned as a temporary project for the construction site hoardings. The artist envisions the site of the Westgate development as a notional compass, placing the city of Oxford at the centre of the world.
The Westgate site is approached as a global axis, taking the idea of Oxford as the 0 degree point of a new Cultural Meridian which circles the globe according to 8 points on the compass. Places crossed by each proposed Meridian are illustrated on the 8 hoarding roundels, providing direct links between Oxford and places around the globe bisected by the line.
In his creation of The Westgate Cultural Meridian Adam Dant invites audiences to engage in this ‘speculative geography’ and to consider the cultural, local and global connections of time and place.
‘My inspiration for the piece came in part from the people who live here and the public workshops at The Bodleian Library Print Studio. The curators at the Library also uncovered fascinating maps and relics that contributed to the final piece.’
Adam Dant, 2016
The roundels were on display on the hoardings at St Ebbe’s, with smaller roundels indicating the compass points circumnavigating the site hoardings, from spring 2016 to summer 2017.
