A+E Lab // Matthew Foster // Artist in Residency
Director Matthew Foster is from a fine art background and began his career working with gallery technical teams. He established Plane Structure in 2011 to fulfill a need for skilled art fabricators in Birmingham. Since then the company and its workshop has grown to deliver specialist carpentry and joinery as well as gallery installation. Plane Structure now works with arts organisations, architects and creative business on a wide range of projects.
Plane Structure works with artists, designers, galleries, architects and businesses to design and make artworks, furniture, display furniture, plinths and exhibition stands. We project manage and deliver whole gallery exhibition installations and hang and maintain art collections for corporate clients.
Source: http://plane-structure.co.uk/about/
Matt first Artist in Residency at A+E LAB!
We wanted to commission Matt to fabricate a bespoke sprung floor to be fitted into our space so that we could accommodate all sorts of activities and events but mainly to be able to create new company work.
We started discussions with Matt back in September 2021, explaining the vision for our A+E Lab, the artist in residence and commission program, and the brief we had for the commission, which he gladly accepted straight away.
We were also performing at the Birmingham International Dance Festival and managed to meet him and his family, for them to experience ‘0AR,’ one of our current works on tour.
Matt explained to us that he built the dance floor for the English National Ballet as a touring floor. He also built a similar model for the Birmingham Royal Ballet and another for the Acosta School in Cuba as well as the Laban Dance School in London in a temporary studio.
Finally, we invited Matt to come to our new space in Chatham in late October. It was great to finally meet in person and for Matt to get a feel for the space and the environment around the building as well.
We could take exact measurements, spot issues and already discuss solutions.
We came across many obstacles, such as the necessary opening of fire doors, importance of ramps, removal of items from previous tenants and moreover how to organise our first artist in residence inside the site, which is run by the Historic Dockyard and owned by the University of Kent.
But while we all jumped the loops and hoops with the grace of a unicorn we were in the meantime in a deep collaborative process to draw the sprung floor and its removal panels.
Matt was really effective and quick in his work. Due to longer negotiations with the Estate team from the University we had to push back the deadline we originally gave to Matt. But Matt was already fabricating the sprung floor and was waiting for our green light to come and install it in our space.
Happy Christmas ! Happy New year!
Monday 21st February, 6 month after meeting with Matt for the first time, he as finally arrived with all the supplies for the sprung floor.
The result was awesome! And all the ramps are already been proven to be super helpful for us still moving in and moving trolleys around all day long.
Thank you Matt!
Next we need to install the dance floor!
