'Board Game for Byker', Byker Metro Station

Image: © Andrew Curtis Taken: 20 Nov 2015

'The Point of the Game is to Play' by Michael Crilly and Chris Morton (2015) is the sixth and final commission for Byker Metro station funded by Newcastle City Council, Arts Council England and Nexus, which owns and manages Metro. Michael Crilly explained: “The work is a DaDa-ish inspired mash-up of a number of community selected video characters, board game pieces and random rules that have been relocated to a bespoke playable map of Byker and the East End of Newcastle. “It is inspired by the architect Ralph Erskine’s inclusion of a life size chess-board into the redevelopment of the Byker estate during the 1970s, alongside communal gaming areas and hobby rooms that all remain unique to the estate. “Like Erskine, we think that a sense of community is strengthened through encouraging social interaction and playing games together is an important part of this” Chris added: “We have allowed residents to select their favourite avatar or playing piece and gaming rules. We have then taken the most interesting and combined these into a prototype playable board game – where the point is just to encourage people to play.” http://www.nexus.org.uk/news/item/board-game-byker-giant-new-artwork-metro

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