Hello Hoxton High Street aims to make art an everyday part of life for local residents and visitors by making PEER Gallery much more inviting and accessible.
The gallery, which occupies two single-glazed 1970s shop units that look onto Hoxton high street, is crowdfunding on Spacehive to dramatically transform their outward appearance. This will include a new single-entrance façade and installing internal see-through shutters so that exhibitions will still be visible at night and when the gallery is closed.
“A new façade is very important to PEER as our long-standing interest and ethos is to make the best quality contemporary art available to the local high street. We believe everyone should be able to access art and by having it on the high street it becomes as much a part of everyday life as visiting the post office or local shops.” Gemma Lloyd, Deputy Director of PEER
PEER has been based on Hoxton Street since 2002 and has exhibited more than 50 world-class artists, many of whom are Hackney residents. Having such a popular and valued space, and many local connections, crowdfunding seemed like the logical next step.
“Crowdfunding our project on Spacehive has really helped us to get local residents interested and engaged. What’s been surprising is the amount of donations and support we’ve received. We’ve found that people are very generous when they really understand what you’re trying to do.”
Khadija, Gallery Trainee at Peer
To date, the project has attracted 180 backers and raised over £25,000 on Spacehive.
Today the Mayor of London pledged £19,000 to Hello Hoxton High Street.