From April 2023 work on the cultural and community engagement strands of Middlesbrough’s High Street Heritage Action Zone have been the focus of research by Newcastle University MSc Student Lucy Blakemore. Lucy has spent time volunteering with Navigator North in The Masham, speaking with visitors, interviewing stakeholders and undergoing a period of research into the work we have been undertaking here in Middlesbrough as part of Historic England’s nationwide HSHAZ programme.
We invited Lucy to write a blog post about her experiences and what she has discovered through her research.
My name is Lucy Blakemore and I’m an Urban Planning MSc student at Newcastle University, and I’m particularly interested in understanding how histories embedded into the built environment can be represented and engaged with in heritage-led regeneration. Inspired by a desire to research my local area of Teesside and based on an interest I had in adopting a theoretical framework of care as discussed by Fisher and Tronto in their 1990 work titled ‘Toward a Feminist Theory of Caring’, my dissertation explores Middlesbrough’s High Street Heritage Action Zone (HSHAZ). It particularly focuses on the role and impact that the cultural programme ‘Celebrating Hidden Middlesbrough’ has had in terms of using art to tap into Middlesbrough’s hidden histories and engage people in heritage. By being attuned to how heritage is engaged with in the HSHAZ, in terms of physically in the form of public realm improvements in the Historic Quarter, but also emotionally related to engaging memories and platforming different voices (historic, artistic, public) my dissertation intends to explore the care relations and connections between people, place, past, present (and future) in Middlesbrough. My hope is that my dissertation will have the potential to generate conclusions and recommendations that support the role of the arts and creative community in planning, by considering how cultural programmes can generate interest and engagement in heritage-led regeneration.
When tasked with deciding on a topic for my dissertation although I knew I wanted to focus on Teesside and link it to conservation, I originally struggled to consolidate a research focus. Key interests I had developed throughout my degree were investigating urban memory and exploring a framework of care which had started to be applied to conservation. As explored by Veldpaus and Szemzö in their 2021 chapter titled ‘Heritage as a Matter of Care, and Conservation as Caring for the Matter’ this conceptualisation crucially asks which histories are selected and whose voices are heard in the conservation process. By chance I came across a video about Middlesbrough’s HSHAZ on Historic England’s YouTube channel. The video emphasised the focus of ‘Celebrating Hidden Middlesbrough’ as ‘history as everyone’s voice’ and I decided, it sort of felt like fate, that I was to focus my dissertation on Middlesbrough- a local town which I had visited since a young age, a local town which I had seen the high street and Historic Quarter change, and a local town whose history I was largely unaware of but intrigued to uncover. The creative cultural programme ‘Celebrating Hidden Middlesbrough’ focused on engaging different voices and forgotten histories, and this is exactly what I wanted to research.
Therefore, the research questions I have formulated for my dissertation are to analyse, firstly, how art has been used to interpret and represent Middlesbrough’s hidden histories. Secondly, I aim to consider the use of art-based approaches to encourage community engagement. Finally, I intend to consider if community engagement and the creative outputs have influenced proposed changes to Middlesbrough’s Historic Quarter, and/or shaped understandings of Middlesbrough’s heritage. This aims to determine if there are connections between the physical and cultural work of the HSHAZ.
‘Penumbra’ by Bethany Hunton in The Tunnel Gallery, and Exchange Square. Representing art and public realm transformations within the HSHAZ. Photo Credits: Lucy Blakemore
The data collection that I am conducting, at the moment, is volunteering at The Masham where I am helping with the exhibitions and keeping a journal on my experience. I am conducting interviews with various people who have been involved in the HSHAZ, and I will be doing visual and document analysis of the creative outputs of the HSHAZ (Tunnel Gallery, exhibitions, commissions, maps etc.), engaging particularly with information on the Historic Quarter website. This will allow me to answer my research questions and identify key themes.
I am so excited to research Middlesbrough’s HSHAZ, to closely consider how art has been used to expand the historic narrative of the town beyond ‘Ironopolis’, and also has potentially encouraged and mobilised conversations regarding Middlesbrough’s future.
