Top artist’s homage to wartime structure to be unveiled in forest
THE POST-WAR role of Dalby Forest in replenishing the nation’s timber supplies is being celebrated with the instalment of a new sculpture.
Turner Prize winning artist Rachel Whiteread has created the artwork, entitled Nissen Hut and it will go on display in the North Yorkshire forest on Wednesday.
The artwork is Ms Whiteread’s first permanent public sculpture in the UK and it was commissioned to mark next year’s centenary of the Forestry Commission and as part of 14-18 NOW, the UK’s arts programme for the centenary of the First World War.
The sculpture consists of a concrete cast of the interior space of a Nissen hut, the distinctive military structure invented by Major Peter Nissen during the First World War.
These prefabricated steel structures were easy to erect and had various uses, including as field hospitals, workshops, housing and even churches.
The huts were used to house labourers on Forestry Commission land after the organisation was set up in 1919 to address the nation’s depleted timber stocks following the war effort.
In Dalby Forest, the structures were used as part of a 1930s work camp which provided much needed local employment and training during a programme of mass tree planting.
Ms Whiteread said: “Nissen Huts are an indigenous part of our post-war architecture. Placing this sculpture deep in the heart of Dalby Forest will lead visitors on a journey of discovery to its final resting place, a quiet memorial to these extraordinary structures.”
Ian Gambles, director of the Forestry Commission, added: “Dalby was one of the first forests to be planted by the Forestry Commission after we were founded almost 100 years ago, so it is entirely fitting that it is now the lasting home of this extraordinary piece of art.
“Whiteread’s sculpture is a moving testament to the lasting relationship we have had with our changing landscapes over the past century.”