A Wee Tate in Greenock?

I was in Greenock today for a meeting at the fab Beacon Arts Centre with Alec Galloway and Rod Miller, who are both involved with a community arts project called Absent Voices.

Absent Voices is made up of eight visual artists, musicians and writers. Their collective aim is to explore the industrial heritage of Greenock's historic sugar sheds through their art.

After our meeting, Alec and Rod took me down to the sugar sheds at James Watt Dock.

These vast red-brick and cast-iron sheds with distinctive zig-zag frontage, sit just off the dual carriageway as you drive into Greenock from the Glasgow side.

Morton FC's stadium, Cappielow, is right opposite the Clydeport-owned sheds while the Titan crane (the oldest in existence) sits right by its side.

Like me, the chances are you will have driven past the sheds countless times and thought nothing of them.

Closed by sugar giant, Tate & Lyle, in 1995, the building gradually became more and more dilapidated, despite various attempts to put it to good use. In 2011, the Tall Ships Race used the sheds as part of the festivities.

It opened many people's eyes to the possibility of this quite magical industrial space which once thrummed with the day-to-day toil of turning raw sugar cane into the refined sugar we put in our tea with never a thought for how it got from cane to cube.

There has been an element of regeneration and restoration in the last few years. I was amazed to see a small marina outside the sheds, which have now been made wind and water-tight.

I took this view out over the marina to the Firth of Clyde from the upper floor of the shed on the left hand side as you look at the building from the dual carriageway.

The best description I can come up with for the sheds is to call them 'industrial cathedrals'.

The huge vaulted roof space was vital to the process of sugar-making. Sugar was poured in through lipped openings at the top of the hollow cast iron pillars which hold the building up creating sweet white mountains.

The more we walked around, the more I could see this space as a Tate Greenock (or a Wee Tate…). I'll leave you with that thought. Well, if the V&A can come to Dundee…

The artists involved in Absent Voices are; Alec Galloway, Alastair Cook, Rod Miller, Yvonne Lyon, Kevin McDermott, Ryan King. Alan Carlisle and Anne McKay.

I'm really looking forward to seeing and hearing their work unfold over the next 15 months.

You can listen in to Radio Inverclyde's report on the opening event of Absent Voices at the Albany Theatre in Greenock last month HERE

This includes an interview with musician Kevin McDermott, best known as lead singer with The Kevin McDermott Orchestra.