There was a huge financial boost this week for the struggling town of Ellesmere Port, as it was awarded a European grant for its ongoing community art project ‘The Trolley Depression’.
The art project has been running for two years in Ellesmere Port, and is the first of its kind in the UK. Every member of the town is participating in the art project, which seeks to create art installations around the town using trolleys from their sponsors Asda, Morrisons, Aldi, B&M, Wilko and The Food Warehouse by Iceland.
Supermarket Sainsbury’s is the only retailer to opt out of the art project.
Beautiful images of the seemingly abandoned trolleys, like the one above, have been appearing around the town highlighting the despair, depression and struggle of a port town in the current economic market. Sometimes the art installations contain more than one trolley and can even feature trolleys from different ‘clans’, symbolising how the community binds together in adversity.
Darren Henley, the Chief Executive of the Arts Council of England, commended the town of Ellesmere Port for winning the award, against very stiff opposition.
He commented to the Bugle.
Ellesmere Port did incredibly well to win this prestigious grant. The Trolley Depression is an incredible body of work by a talented community, all rallying together to create genuine art.
It’s not clear how Ellesmere Port will invest the £30,000, but community artist Ian Packham, from Great Sutton, has an idea of how it shouldn’t be spent. He told the Bugle:
We’ve got be careful this money doesn’t change us. We can’t go cleaning up the Port as it will ruin the integrity of our art.
The art project has had its detractors over the years, with some claiming it’s just a load of abandoned trolleys from people who can’t be bothered to carry their own shopping.
Mr Packham has a response for these people though.
Bloody Philistines. They don’t understand true art so they mock it. I weep for their souls.
A decision on how the grant will be spent is expected after the next council meeting.
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