Evaluation Reports
PROJECT Evaluation Report, June 2006
Comedia was commissioned by Public Art South West to make an independent evaluation of PROJECT: engaging artists in the built environment in July 2004, before any awards had been made. The research focused on the extent to which the mindset and working practice of those involved in each project: architects, planners, developers, urban designers, engineers and artists changed as a consequence of the experience. Data was gathered on a 'before and after' basis from 36 participants in 12 projects. Several personal journals and detailed case studies were also included in the evaluation.
The evaluation asked four questions:
1 Did the people involved change their mindsets and/or working practices?
2 Has there been any impact on long term practice of the project players?
3 Has the involvement of artists made any demonstrable difference to projects?
4 Under what conditions does artist input have a positive effect and when does it not?
The findings of this evaluation can be summarised in two maxims:
- Engagement of an artist from an early stage in a development project, in good circumstances, brings about a positive change in mindset and working practice among the other professionals involved.
- When artists are working in a development milieu and expected to contribute their professional expertise and creativity, they should be engaged on the same terms as the other professionals involved.
An Evaluation Toolbox has been produced, in addition to the Evaluation Report, in order to share developing practice with others in the public art field. Both are available as downloads below.
Download Reports
Follow this link to download the full PROJECT Evaluation Report suitable for colour printers, as an Adobe Acrobat format document: 1.25 Mb
Follow this link to download the full PROJECT Evaluation Report suitable for black and white printers, as an Adobe Acrobat format document: 1.45 Mb
Follow this link to download the Evaluation Toolbox as an Adobe Acrobat format document: 365 Kb
Interim Evaluation Report, April 2005
Comedia's interim report sets out the evaluation methodology for this research and identifies emerging issues from the first evaluation feedback from successful projects.