David Lemm

Open Close
2017 - 2021

A collaborative public art project responding to the closes of the Royal Mile, Edinburgh

Rebuilt
Painted steel
90 x 168cm (x2)
Remade 2021

Orignally a temporary installation and commissioned as a permanent public artwork by Edinburgh World Heritage in 2021. In 2017 these window spaces sat empty alongside the original railings under the word ‘Rebuilt’. These historic railings were in disrepair and I saw this as an opportunity to respond directly to the existing vernacular of the close, so used the shapes and motifs in the existing railings as building blocks to create new designs. This acts as a simple metaphor for the re-working or re-imagining of the closes and the new structures sit in conversation with the original fittings.



Glimpse
Exposed silk screen and aluminium frame
112 x 142cm (x 3)

Temporary installation, Chalmers Close, Edinburgh.
Each frame is compositionally informed by the windows of the surrounding buildings which dominate and look into the close. The imagery also references the architecture of the close and how it funnels our vision, inviting a reframing of otherwise overlooked details.