David Barrie
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
David Barrie (born 5 April 1964) is a producer and director of media, design and urban renewal projects and programs.
Barrie has produced and directed factual television programs for broadcasters including the BBC, Channel 4, WNET, National Geographic, and CNN. He has made documentary films on subjects like the pre-history of the Sahara Desert, the death of rock star Michael Hutchence, the rise of the National Front (France), the invention of Oboe (navigation) systems by Alec Reeves of Standard Telephones and Cables during the Second World War, and the arms trade in Liberia, West Africa. Barrie's programmes have included interviews with Jean-Luc Godard, Georg Baselitz, Alexander McQueen, Victoria Beckham, and Sadie Frost. In 2000, Barrie was arrested and imprisoned on false charges of espionage by President Charles Taylor (Liberia) while making a documentary in the country with journalist Sorious Samura.
Alongside his work in the media, Barrie creates and delivers innovative design, creative and community projects, often linked to urban renewal, sustainable development and co-design. This work has been broadcast on television, featured in The New York Times and Observer newspapers and been exhibited in China, the USA, Russia, and India.
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[edit] Urban Farming, Middlesbrough
In 2007, Barrie designed and led a project in which over a thousand people grew food across the town of Middlesbrough, North East England. The project was designed to raise new opportunities for urban agriculture and local food production in the urban planning of the town. Food was grown in over 250 locations. The final harvest formed the ingredients of a 'town meal' attended by over 6000 people. The locations chosen by the town's new 'urban farmers' formed the basis of an 'edible map' of the town, created by architects Andre Viljoen and Katrin Bohn. The project was part of Dott07, a year of community projects, events and exhibitions based in North East England that explored what life in a sustainable region could be like. It is a national initiative of the Design Council in the U.K. The project is to run again in 2008, led by local public sector and community organizations.
[edit] The Wishing Tree Project, Chongqing
Barrie is participating in The Wishing Tree project, a community involvement project in the municipality of Chongqing, south-west China, led by the British Council and the Chongqing Municipal Civil Affairs Bureau. The project is centered on enabling public participation in civil affairs in China.
[edit] The Castleford Project
The Castleford Project is a £14.5m ($30m) program of public realm renewal in the deprived, former coalfields town of Castleford, West Yorkshire. It started with a corporate social investment of £100k ($200k) by Channel 4 Television in 2003. The project is enabling a program of improvement that is supported by an especially formed partnership of public agencies and community organisations and has been credited with leveraging £250m ($500m) new investment in the town. It features new work by architects and artists, including Martha Schwartz (USA), Jan Gehl Architects (Denmark), Winter and Horbelt (Germany), Carlos Garaicoa (Cuba), and UK designers Renato Benedetti, DSDHA and Sarah Wigglesworth. The project's social innovation, development of open systems of public administration and culture- and community-led development has been highlighted at several international conferences. It will be featured in a special series of Channel 4 Television's Grand Designs in 2008.
[edit] Power to Change
In 1995, Barrie conceived and ran Power to Change, an art and design initiative on the adaptive reuse of the decommissioning Magnox nuclear power facility at Trawsfynydd, in the Snowdonia National Park, Wales. This project featured the extensive involvement of the local community and new work by architects Will Alsop, Kathryn Findlay and James Wines, artist Bruce McLean, music composer Gavin Bryars, photographer John Davies and engineers Arup. It included the participation of artist Rachel Whiteread, architect Cedric Price and was broadcast by BBC Television. It has featured in several histories of contemporary design.
[edit] The Spaghetti Junction Project
The Spaghetti Junction Project was a design ideas initiative on the adaptive reuse of vacant wasteland beneath the cloverleaf highway interchange in the West Midlands, UK known as Spaghetti Junction. The project ran in 1990, was televised by the BBC and featured new work by architects Edward Cullinan, Robert Adam, landscape architect Pirkko Higson and Narrative Architecture Today designer Melanie Sainsbury. It was presented at the National Museum Cardiff and Royal Institute of British Architects in an exhibition designed by Project Orange.
[edit] Trivia
Barrie is nephew of the late Cyril Bennett, the former Controller of Programmes and one of the founding fathers of London Weekend Television, the UK broadcaster and TV producer.
He was the presenter of a series of programmes for young people broadcast by Channel 4 Television in 1983 and described by The Face (magazine) as "the most scared man on British television".
A documentary Barrie made in 1998 on competition hairdressing was a key inspiration for the movie Blow Dry.
[edit] External links
- David Barrie — blog
- Dott07 — Urban Farming Project, Middlesbrough
- British Council China Project, Social Innovation
- The Castleford Project
- Power to Change
- 'The Guardian' — article on The Castleford Project
- Magazine article by Barrie on democracy and urban renewal
- Magazine article by Barrie on creativity and urban renewal
- "Freed journalists tell of Liberian terror" — BBC News; 2000-08-26.
- Death of Michael Hutchence — BBC News report
- David Barrie at the Internet Movie Database