Battersea Arts Station – Free marketing

 

battersea arts final

Battersea Power Station Development Company’s  “Battersea Art Station”- by submitting artists give consent for unpaid use for the company’s marketing.

Battersea Power Station Development Company has organised an art competition Battersea Arts Station hosted at the Battersea Arts Centre, an open weekend on the 25th-27th September exhibiting art inspired by Battersea Power Station. Amateur and professional artists were invited to submit work of the iconic building and now have the chance of being awarded prizes.

On the first of September Battersea Power Station Development Company announced that over 500 artworks had been submitted from all around the world including photography, poetry, oil paintings and cast iron sculptures. What they didn’t mention was that the artists might have faced a surprise after submitting their artwork.

Before the artists submitted their art they had access to the Data Protection terms and conditions. However they were not able to see the terms and conditions of having their work displayed at the exhibition until after submitting. Yet submitting meant they agree to these unseen terms and conditions. These could only be read and agreed to once the form had been fully filled out and the artists’ work submitted.

Therefore the artists were unaware that the Battersea Arts Station, part of the Battersea Power Station Development Company, intend to use the artists’ work for marketing, promotional or broadcasting purposes, as well as reproduction without paying.

Here is a section of the terms and conditions which the artists only saw after they submitted their work (BPSDC is the Battersea Power Station Development Company):

10.2 By submitting Work(s), You consent to BPSDC and/or BAC and/or another third party permitted by the BPSDC or BAC: (1) filming and making available the whole or any part of the Work(s), including but not limited to the right to include the Work(s) in any broadcast (and rebroadcast) by any broadcaster (including the BBC) and any licensees of any broadcaster; (2) filming, broadcasting and/or reproducing the whole or any part of the Work(s) for archival, educational, publicity and marketing (including without limitation on the website, exhibition posters, leaflets, private view cards and all forms of social media), press, signage, gallery guide and catalogue purposes and (3) reproducing images of the whole or any part of the Work(s) from the Website that have been submitted by You. The above consent is irrevocable and given without payment of any fee or royalty and includes consent to make available the Work(s) in all media (including without limitation all forms of electronic and social media) for perpetuity and on a world-wide basis.

We await to see what kind of art is submitted but no doubt the winners will be be suitable for (free) marketing purposes.

Co-written by Elina Kuusio

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See our Battersea Power Station project pages for more information and videos.
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Health and safety gone mad?… Events held at Battersea Power Station despite ‘big chunks falling off’ chimneys

The first of Battersea Power Station’s emblematic cream chimneys is likely to be demolished this month by its current owners, the Battersea Power Station Development Company (BPSDC), which is part of the Sime Darby consortium. The company claims its intention is to replace the chimneys – which it says are beyond repair (despite evidence to the contrary) – with identical replicas. However both John Broome’s precedent and discrepancies between the company’s reasoning and its actions suggest this might never happen, as, of course, does the commercial potential of the site, without the power station sitting awkwardly in the centre of it.

Footage shows Robert Tincknell, Chief Executive Officer of Battersea Power Station Development Company, insisting that the chimneys have “structurally failed” and that “big chunks are falling off”. However the company continues to lease the site for public events, including Everyman Cinema film screenings and ‘Street Feasts’, held in the shadow of the chimneys Tincknell says are disintegrating. Event-goers have not been told to wear hard hats or other protective gear, but perhaps this is because these things would be useless in the event that an entire chimney is brought down by high wind, as Richard Barrett, an Irish property investor who co-owned Battersea Power Station before it was bought by the Sime Darby consortium, has previously suggested may happen at any time.

The Sime Darby consortium – which has been accused of exploiting the local community at their oil palm plantation in Liberia – have so far put up only £11 million of bond money to guarantee the replacement of the chimneys, a woefully small sum, and one suggested by their own employee, Philip Gullet, Chief Operating Officer at Battersea Power Station Development Company. In addition to this the bond money has been deposited into an account with Malaysian bank CIMB, making it more difficult for Wandsworth Council and English Heritage to access it in the event that Battersea Power Station Development Company default. According to campaigners, it is imperative to its retrieval that the bond money is moved to a British bank account.

In response to these criticisms, Battersea Power Station Development Company have agreed to a meagre compromise; they will demolish one chimney to begin with and must partially rebuild this before they can demolish the other three. This is still flouting the Council’s original rules, which said that the chimneys must be demolished one at a time.
Campaigners believe that partially rebuilding one tower is not enough to guarantee the completion of four new chimneys. They suggest that Battersea Power Station Development Company are clearing the site little by little and point to the fact that, despite owning a vast swathe of riverfront, Battersea Power Station Development Company have removed the power station’s listed cranes purportedly to allow the chimney rubble to be removed by boat. There are concerns that the cranes won’t be brought back, and some consider their removal to be further evidence that Sime Darby have no intention of actually renovating the power station.

However, in an unusually considerate move,Battersea Power Station Development Company have at least set up a helpline number, for those traumatised by the sight of the maimed power station scarring the skyline, perhaps during their daily commute.

Our short video comments on the discrepancy between the developer’s claim that the chimneys are rapidly disintegrating, and their actions in allowing public events to take place on site, directly below the “structurally failed” chimneys. It also includes the helpline number, in case you feel personally disturbed by the destruction of Battersea Power Station.

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Battersea Power Station to Lose Chimneys During Renovation

Battersea Power Station could be temporarily left with just one solitary chimney after developers applied to change conditions of work on the listed building. Last week the Battersea Power Station Development Company (BPSDC) applied for permission to change the sequence in which the listed building’s chimneys are rebuilt.

The new application, called a deed of variation, proposes a change to the original legal agreement, between Wandsworth Council and English Heritage, so that the first chimney could be rebuilt on its own.

The power station with one chimney

The remaining three would then be rebuilt at the same time. A safeguard will also be added to the legal agreement which will require the developer to provide a bond for the full value of the chimney works contract before the project can get under way. The council could use this bond to pay for the completion of the project if for any reason the developer failed to finish.

No changes are being proposed to the design of the chimneys which would be constructed according to the original architecture plans so that they match the appearance of the originals. The development company estimates that changing the sequence of the chimney works would mean the power station restoration project could be completed two years earlier.

In 2011 Wandsworth Council and English Heritage approved plans for each of the decayed chimneys to be rebuilt after successive engineering studies showed all four were beyond repair.

Last month the Wandsworth Guardian reported campaigner’s fears the power station could permanently lose its famous chimneys once they were taken down. and a final decision on whether to approve the proposals will be made by the council’s planning applications committee.

“It is entirely plausible the owners will take the chimneys down and then contrive some reason why they can’t be rebuilt. Council planners are now examining the application in detail.’ Keith Garner – Power station campaigner 

View the Wandsworth application and enter reference number 2013/3076.

 

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