The context

Yellow Submarine is located under a bridge. The area already had its advantages before: you could sit around there without the chance of getting wet by the rain, and if you went to meet someone 'under the bridge', everybody knew what you meant. But it wasn't an attractive location, more: quite the opposite. Like a whole lot of other venues where nobody bothers, this place was a perfect location to post illegally.

The commission

Emilio Lopez-Menchero changes the place into a pleasant location and meeting place by a few targeted interferences. A big yellow object brings light and colour under the roof. The artwork reminds us of a submarine or surfboard and in so doing, connects with the water nearby. But also the comparison with a skateboard comes to mind; a wink at youngsters' daily life. The positive energy of this project inspired the city of Ghent to renew some streets. A big blue arrow now functions as a billboard and now legitimises to placard on this place, pointing at the centre, where you have to be for the activities on the billboard. The surfboard emphasises the here and now of this meeting place. A place to make arrangements, to sit around or to hang around what the artist has called 'Yellow Submarine'.

Emilio Lopez-Menchero

Emilio Lopez-Menchero was born in 1960 in Mol and studied architecture and art at la Cambre in Brussels. In Flanders, Lopez-Menchero gained fame with a sound-installation (Tarzankreten) in Over the Edges 2000, a city exhibition organized by S.M.A.K. His work can be seen in different countries, for example at the Poëziezomer of Watou, the Parcours d'artistes at Sint-Gillis and gallery la Lettre Volée.