WATCH: £240k 'circular amphitheatre' for Inverness river banks
Budget lost £60k to ditched Tilting Pier project scrapped in 2016.
Last updated 24th May 2018
Plans to build a public art attraction on the Highland capital's River Ness will cost £240,000.
The budget has already lost £60k to a ditched proposal to build a £300,000 Tilting Pier which Highland councillors scrapped in 2016 after public outcry over the design.
Earlier artists Sans façon and OSA revealed their new concept for ‘the Gathering Place,’ the centrepiece of the River Ness Public Art project.
“I am confident that it will enhance the location and be very well received by everyone" - Cllr MacKenzie, Chair, Inverness City Arts
According to the local authority, the artwork called ‘My Ness,’ will be sited at the Little Isle Pool, Fisherman’s Car Park, and will 'provide a focal point for people to gather, linger and enjoy an area of great natural beauty in the centre of the city.
'It will reference circular amphitheatre, with elements on both banks to frame the river, incorporating an elegant walkway, seating area, and viewing point projecting over the water between the existing trees.'
The total cost of the River Ness Public Art project is funded by Creative Scotland (£305,000), City of Inverness Common Good Fund (£250,000), HIE (£66,000) and the Highland Council (£106,000) and managed by the Inverness City Arts Working Group for the Highland Council.
Tristan Surtees of Sans façon told MFR News: "The work aims to complement the river and people’s relationship to it, to frame and invite others to appreciate it.
"A thin ribbon of stone frames the Ness, starting as an access, becoming a path to run along for a child, a bench for reading a book, a viewing point up and down the river, a back-rest for looking across it.
"In its upstream portion it weaves through the trees and bushes to offer a unique view up the river or back to the Castle and Cathedral."
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Professor Jim Mooney, Chair of the independent Evaluation Panel added: "The Evaluation Panel members were unanimous in their enthusiastic response to the reworked proposal.
"The Evaluation Panel was impressed by the expansion of the site to include the opposite bank of the River Ness and by the elegance and innovation embodied by the new design."