New sculpture for Howden Park

Mar 11 2010 by Marjorie Kerr, West Lothian Courier

THE finishing touch to Livingston’s revamped Howden Park Centre is set to be unveiled this week.

The four-piece “Florum Cultura” by award-winning artist Michael Visocchi was commissioned for the building and consists of two small relief panels inside the building and four steel geometric shapes ranging in height from two to just over three metres, in the centre’s grounds.

Michael Visocchi is a graduate of Glasgow School of Art and in 2008 his monumental sculpture “The Gilt of Cain” was unveiled by Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu.

To create the work for Livingston, Michael Visocchi took his inspiration for the sculpture from a range of sources.

He consulted with West Lothian arts groups and people living in and around Howden, researched the history of the area through the planning and development of the new town, heraldic links to medieval Knights Templar and formal garden planning.

The indoor wall panel is a shallow relief work inside Howden Park Centre that takes its design from the plans of ornamental Georgian garden layouts and the plasterwork detailing found on the walls and ceilings of stately homes of the period.