Barbara Cole has been working in the field of art in public space for more than three decades as an artist, curator, consultant, and educator.
Cole is a founding and producing member of Other Sights for Artists' Projects (2005–present), a Vancouver-based non-profit society that presents temporary public art projects responsive to the aesthetic, economic and regulatory conditions of public space. She also established Cole Projects, a public art consulting practice that developed new methodologies for commissioning artists and engaging publics. Through her work with Other Sights and her tenure as Curator of Outdoor Art at the University of British Columbia (2017–2023), Cole's projects explore the conditions of public space, processes of engagement, and duration. Her independent, cross-disciplinary art practice has included large-scale, site-specific outdoor works (1980–1992) and gallery installations (1993–2003), followed by a series of collaborative projects with the Other Sights production team (2005–present). She has recently returned to studio-based research, focusing on textile processes.
Barbara Cole, Trouble, 2013. Manipulated tarlatan cloth, contact print on paper. 76 × 76cm. From Corporate Structures series.
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Art Practice
Cole has contributed to collaborative works in public space as a producing member of the artist collective Other Sights for Artists' Projects (2005-present). Her earlier independent works were site specific, often situated in non-urban settings, and took the form of hand-built structures from which to experience the surrounds. From the mid-90s onwards, her discrete studio-based works and gallery installations feature a wide variety of sculptural materials such as bronze, wood and rubber; still photography and video; and fibres and textiles. She is currently producing hand-woven cloth.
Barbara Cole, There Was This Field, 1985. Wood, soil, planted barley. Tynehead Park, Surrey, BC.
Curation
Cole's curatorial work has focused on artists whose situation-specific and process-based projects respond and evolve in relation to sites, contexts, and audiences. She led Outdoor Art projects at UBC through the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery (2017-2023), including temporary works such as Vegetal Encounters, a five-year residency with Holly Schmidt (2019-2024); Sonic Responses (2020); and a number of sited performance-based works as part of the Soundings exhibition (2020). Some selected projects from those presented through Other Sights, see Coastal Camera Obscura (2017), Donald Lawrence; Deadhead (2014), Cedric, Nathan and Jim Bomford; Grow (2011), Holly Schmidt; and The Games are Open (2010), Köbberling and Kaltwasser.
Cedric, Nathan, and Jim Bomford, Deadhead, 2014. Curatorial Lead, Barbara Cole, Other Sights. Installation on a WWII barge with accompanying program of performances and events while moored in Heritage Harbour and False Creek, BC. Salvaged wood, with some sections wrapped in photo murals on tarpaulin. Photo: Michael Love.
Public Art Consulting
Cole Projects Public Art Consulting was formed in 2005, providing curatorial and project management services to clients in private development, the public sector, and municipal public art programs. This work was multi-phased, including public art planning, artist selection, and project oversight through to artwork installation. Taking a curatorial approach to how art opportunities were framed and the work of artists supported, Cole describes her consulting work as being fundamentally artist-centered. Selected projects of note include the Northeast False Creek Public Art Master Plan (2018); Michael Lin, RGB (2018), Bosa Properties, Central Presbyterian Church; Kelly Lycan, The Shape of Things (2018), Beedie Group; and Myfanwy MacLeod and Shannon Oksanen, Playtime (2016), Provincial Health, BC Children’s and BC Women’s Hospital. From 2017 to present, Cole works as a mentor and advisor to women entering the field of art in public space.
Eric Deis, Spared, 2010. Digital image, commissioned by Cole Projects for Parklane Homes, East Fraserlands River District Public Art Program & Area 2 Detailed Public Art Plan, submitted to the City of Vancouver Public Art Committee, December 6, 2010.
Writing
Cole’s writing spans curatorial essays, articles, public lectures and public art plans. Selected examples:
“Nurturing Resistance”, Holly Schmidt: Forecast. Vancouver: Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, University of British Columbia, 2024. 8–15. Print.
“Coastal Camera Obscura: Casting the Eye Adrift”, Donald Lawrence. Ed. Charo Neville. Kamloops: Kamloops Art Gallery, 2023. Print.
“Revelatory Affect of Remembering”, Deadhead. Cedric, Nathan and Jim Bomford. Ed. Lorna Brown, Vancouver: Other Sights for Artists’ Projects, Burrard Arts Foundation, 2015. 15–19. Print.
“Annotated Chronology”. The Games are Open. Ed. Lorna Brown. Vancouver: Other Sights for Artists’ Projects, 2015. Print.
“Hijacked Narratives”, Canadian Theatre Review, Vancouver after 2010. Ed. Peter Dickinson, Kirsty Johnston, and Karen Zaiontz (Fall 2015): 16–21. Print.
Sections: “Framing”, “Research”, “Currency”, “Inhabiting”, and “Negotiations”, GROW, DIY Manual. Ed. Holly Schmidt. Other Sights for Artists’ Projects and Holly Schmidt, 2014. Print.
“Interruptions”, Reclaim the Streets. Ed. Sara Fruchtman, Sophie Pouyanne, and Benjamin Willems. Victoria: Open Space Gallery, 2014. 48–75. Print.
“Folke Köbberling / Martin Kaltwasser, The Games are Open”, Planning Unplanned, Towards a New Function of Art in Society. Ed. Barbara Holub and Christine Hohenbüchler. Vienna: Verlag Fur Moderne Kunst, 2014. 108–111. Print.
“Köbberling and Kaltwasser”, Urban Constellations, Jovis Verlag GmbH, Berlin: urbanlab, 2011: 48–75. Print.
“Making Space”, Podcast - Fillip Magazine, from Symposium Public Art/Space, Vancouver Art Gallery, March 27, 2010
Press
Karen Henry, Surrey Art Gallery (2018). “Barbara Cole: Mending at the Expense of the Sides.” An Open Book (PDF). ISBN 978-0-92018-183-6.
Megan Jenkins, University Affairs (September 10, 2018). “How a New Curator at UBC Is Revitalizing Familiar Spaces on Campus.”
Rosemary Heather (November 16, 2020). Markham’s Virtual Public Art Summit: “Becoming Public, Working Art Models and Case Studies for Art in Public.” A virtual summit in nine weekly sessions, October 13–December 11, 2020. “Public Art on Campus (Part 2) – A Conversation with Barbara Cole.”
See the Other Sights press page.
“Barbara Cole – Fellows – ZK/U Berlin.” 2013-10-01.
“Mayor’s Arts Awards Announced.” The Georgia Straight, 2011-09-29.
Barbara Cole, Back, detail. Ikat weaving, pigment on cotton, 1m wide x 27m long.
Get in touch to discuss projects, collaborations, or inquiries
Barbara Cole, Mending at the Expense of the Sides. Photogram on paper. 101.6 x 104.1cm. Surrey Art Gallery collection. Photo: Cameron Heryet.