CJ Mahony for Granta Park
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CJ Mahony, Deboss. Courtesy of the artist.
CAS *Consultancy has been appointed by BioMed Realty to deliver a new public art commission for Granta Park One, Granta Park’s latest research building on its Cambridge campus. BioMed was interested in commissioning a local artist to develop an artwork that could humanise the space, adding a sense of welcome.
Granta Park is an important estate in one of the world’s most dynamic life sciences zones. Home to leading companies including Gilead Sciences, AstraZeneca, Illumina, Pfizer and PPD, the current estate offers 120 acres of inspirational surroundings in rural Cambridgeshire for a population of nearly 4,000 people working at the cutting edge of biomedical research.
Cambridge-based artist CJ Mahony has been selected for the commission and is currently developing a site-responsive work for the building’s atrium that will open to incoming tenants this autumn. For the commission, they are bringing strands of their practice, such as folding and unfolding spaces, crystallisation, and transitional states, into dialogue with the multiple vantage points offered by the atrium space and the scientific activities abundant across the site.
“In decentralising the viewing subject, shifting them to the side as other agents and agencies slide into and out of view and grasp, my practice suggests alternative modes of being present and relating, and opens up space to imagine the hidden life of the visible world.” - CJ Mahony
CJ Mahony, emboss on paper. Courtesy of the artist.
CJ lives and works in Cambridge, having studied Sculpture at Wimbledon School of Art and completing their MA at Camberwell College of Art in 2012. They have undertaken a large number of publicly funded commissions, including Tate, National Theatre Scotland, ITV, National Trust, Cambridge Junction and Opera North. Their work has been featured in solo and group exhibitions internationally and the UK. In 2010, CJ co-founded Aid & Abet, an artist-run project space in Cambridge, which they co-directed until 2014. CJ works as a tutor, mentor and lecturer, and has a studio artist at Wysing Arts Centre.