The city of Kingston upon Hull, with its deep and proud maritime history, stands at a critical juncture in the 21st century. Positioned precariously on the tidal Humber Estuary, it is a place where the water that once brought prosperity now poses an existential threat. This reality is not a distant possibility but a creeping certainty, and it is this urgent, epoch-defining challenge that gave birth to The Shorelines Project. More than a mere public art initiative, Shorelines is a powerful, integrated movement of art, community engagement, and resolute activism, collaboratively led by Rights Community Action (RCA) and local creative agency Drunk Animal Creative Studio.
First and foremost, The Shorelines Project serves as a vital cognitive catalyst. Its central purpose is to take the seemingly abstract, overwhelmingly vast concept of climate change and make it brutally, beautifully real on the streets of Hull. The project's philosophy recognizes that scientific language and government reports often fail to penetrate the daily lives of residents; therefore, it deploys the universal language of art to visualize an "unseen" future—a future defined by the risk of rising sea levels and catastrophic flooding. The ambitious 2000-word scope of this description is necessary, for Shorelines is not a single action, but a sustained, multi-phased campaign—a multifaceted creative tsunami designed to awaken, inform, and ultimately, empower the community to demand comprehensive action from the highest levels of governance.
To truly understand the urgency and profound importance of The Shorelines Project, one must grasp the perilous environmental context of Kingston upon Hull. The city faces the second-highest flood risk of any city in the United Kingdom, a dire statistic rooted in its unique geography. Sitting predominantly on low-lying land, Hull’s vulnerability is stark: an astonishing 90% of the city is below the high-tide line. For context, the city’s average elevation is barely 1.2 meters above sea level. This is a crucial metric, particularly when juxtaposed against scientific projections. The Environment Agency has estimated that without aggressive intervention, global sea levels could rise by up to 1.55 metres over the next 100 years. Such a scenario translates directly into a potentially catastrophic reality for Hull, placing over 100,000 properties at risk from the most extreme weather events.
Furthermore, this is not a theoretical problem; the city has already endured devastating consequences. The memories of the 2007 floods, which overwhelmed drainage systems and tragically led to the evacuation of more than 10,000 homes and widespread damage to schools and infrastructure, remain vivid. Subsequently, the major tidal surge of 2013 provided another harrowing reminder of the city's exposure, resulting in the flooding of around 1,100 properties. Consequently, the citizens of Hull are acutely aware that what were once described as "once-in-a-lifetime" events are becoming alarmingly frequent, exacerbated by the accelerating impact of climate change.
The core mission of Rights Community Action, therefore, was to bridge the gap between scientific fact and civic engagement. While flood defenses have been funded and constructed, the sheer scale of the looming threat requires a fundamental cognitive shift—a move from relying passively on technical solutions to adopting a proactive, community-led stance on adaptation and resilience. In addition to the technical challenge, the social challenge lies in overcoming the sense of resignation or apathy that overwhelming threats can generate. The Shorelines Project was engineered precisely to shatter this barrier, turning public walls into windows onto a shared, demanding future.
The initial phase of The Shorelines Project, running from October 2020 to late 2021, strategically leveraged the visual impact of large-scale street art. The vision was to install a series of monumental murals that would become permanent fixtures, acting as constant, undeniable reminders of the city’s fate should inaction prevail. This campaign of art-tech hybrids and vibrant murals was consciously designed to take the community on a thematic journey, moving from an ominous portrayal of the present danger toward a message of collective hope and empowerment—a transition from 'Dark to Light'.
The first mural, titled "The Girl," was installed on Hull College by local artists Andy Pea and Calvin Innes. This piece was deliberately designed to capture immediate attention and spark profound discussion. It depicted a young, ageless figure seated cross-legged, surrounded by floating toys and child-like drawings of flooded houses. Crucially, the entire scene was rendered in deep, aqueous blues, creating the chilling illusion that the girl was submerged beneath the water's surface, with the blurred silhouette of the iconic Hull Minster visible in the background. By using the technique of sfumato (an ambiguous, smoky look), the girl's expression was left open to interpretation, allowing viewers to project their own fears and hopes onto the face of a generation whose future hangs in the balance.
Subsequently, the campaign rolled out further pieces that deepened the narrative. The second mural, "All is Connected," painted by Calvin Innes in the bustling Hull Paragon Interchange, shifted the focus from domestic risk to global ecology. Created in collaboration with ocean conservationist Nicky 'Nemo' Smedley, this piece served to highlight the fragility of the world’s ecosystems and the vital, yet often overlooked, role of the oceans in regulating river flow and producing global oxygen supplies. Moreover, the mural connected the city’s historical prosperity, built upon its fishing and maritime trade since the 1800s, directly to the health of the sea, thereby demonstrating that the environmental crisis is intrinsically an economic and social one for Hull.
The artistic themes continued to evolve. For example, Andy Pea’s fourth mural, "The Boy," situated on Clumber Street, served as a tribute to "The Girl" but introduced a powerful motif of optimism. Featuring a boy chasing a bright red balloon, a clear reference to the 1956 French film The Red Balloon (a tale of hope and freedom), the artwork shared the message of urgency but, conversely, overlaid it with a sense of achievable aspiration. The murals, including others like Nomad Clan’s "The Time is Now" and Gustavo Chavez Pavon’s "A Dream for Life and Freedom" (created for COP26), were not random splashes of colour; rather, they formed a city-wide trail that utilized Hull's walls as an interactive, educational museum. The project even developed a digital Shorelines Map, allowing visitors to tour the artwork while simultaneously visualizing local flood defenses and areas of high risk.
Building upon this powerful visual foundation, the Shorelines Project launched its second phase, aptly titled "Shorelines: A Perfect Storm." This phase was dedicated to converting the awareness generated by the murals into deep, structural community action. The strategy recognized that resilience is built not just with concrete defenses, but through collective empowerment and co-creation.
The focus shifted from large, passively viewed art to highly localized, participatory workshops and engagement programs, particularly targeting demographics often marginalized in policy discussions: young people. In particular, Shorelines: A Perfect Storm engaged widely with schools, libraries, and youth groups across areas identified as being at high risk and often experiencing high deprivation. The goal was twofold: to provide education on water systems and climate impacts and to teach new creative skills that fostered self-expression and community pride.
As an illustration of this hands-on approach, workshops were conducted in collaboration with organisations such as Artlink Hull, the National Initiative for Creative Education, and community groups like the Friends of Garroby Orchard. In sessions at Pearson Park, children worked with artists to connect with nature, imagining mystical beings and engaging in activities like den building. This connection with urban greenspaces was a subtle but crucial element, highlighting how nature itself can be a component of urban resilience.
Furthermore, young people learned about the mechanics of Hull's flood vulnerability, creating sculptures from recycled materials that visualized the issues their local areas faced. The resulting artwork was not merely decorative; on the contrary, it became political material, displayed at venues like the prestigious Freedom Festival, where the project hosted an exhibition and community podcast sessions. These community workshops deliberately moved beyond "deficit-based models" of communication—where scientists simply tell the public what to do—towards an "asset-based approach," valuing the lived experience and creative input of residents as essential solutions for the city’s future. For the young participants, this was transformative. Quotes from local teachers confirmed that the children gained "so much joy from attending sessions" and were "excited to be asked to be part of the Shorelines project," demonstrating that the initiative successfully turned a terrifying topic into an opportunity for collective, hopeful learning. Consequently, the project produced tangible creative outputs—including three new highly visible public art pieces, a community podcast capturing local voices, a project film, and a presentation at Hull’s flood network event—all driven by the ideas and fears of the people most at risk.
Ultimately, the artistic intervention of The Shorelines Project serves a higher, tangible purpose: to drive decisive policy change and safeguard the city’s long-term future. Indeed, the work of Rights Community Action extends far beyond the canvas and the community hall, directly into the halls of local and national government. The art and engagement act as the voice, providing the data, emotional testimony, and collective demand that policymakers cannot easily dismiss.
The Shorelines Project is deeply intertwined with RCA’s overarching #WeAreHere campaign, which has become a powerful vehicle for uniting residents, grassroots movements, academics, and decision-makers. Through this collaborative effort, Shorelines provided the raw community input necessary to create groundbreaking policy tools. These tools include The People’s Map Hull and The People’s Design Code.
The People’s Map Hull is an ongoing collaborative digital resource designed to capture the community’s collective vision, priorities, and needs—spanning everything from housing and green spaces to flooding and poverty. This map is intentionally built to put pressure on local and national government to consider and act upon the community’s perspective, making it especially useful during the review of Hull City Council’s Local Plan. Likewise, The People's Design Code is an initiative inviting the people of Hull to build a set of non-negotiable standards for the City Council to implement in decisions about land use and development. This grassroots code aims to ensure that future planning decisions prioritize resilience, environmental protection, and community well-being over short-term commercial gains.
Moreover, the campaign has consistently called upon the national government to accept key amendments to legislation, such as the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill, that would allow cities like Hull greater power and funding to protect and prepare themselves for climate disaster. Rights Community Action asserts that Hull has the potential to become a leader in flood prevention—but only if the community raises its voice to the highest levels to ensure that policy is built from the bottom up, not imposed from the top down. Therefore, the project’s legacy is not just aesthetic; it is structural. It has proved that a community-led arts movement can generate genuine dialogue, foster knowledge exchange, and build the relational capacity needed to co-devise solutions with authorities, moving beyond simple consultation to true co-creation.
In conclusion, The Shorelines Project in Hull is far more than a collection of beautiful murals; it is a profound declaration of community self-determination in the face of the climate emergency. Spanning Phase 1’s visual awakening and Phase 2’s deep community immersion, the project has successfully transformed Hull’s walls into a public forum and its citizens into passionate advocates. Ultimately, the core achievement lies in the shift from fear to action—empowering residents to understand that while the threat of a flooded future is real, it is not yet inevitable. The collective efforts, embodied in the powerful art, the engaged workshops, and the actionable policy documents like The People’s Design Code, provide a lasting model for coastal cities worldwide. The Shorelines Project is a continuous wave of resilience, a vibrant testament to the fact that when a community finds its voice through creativity, it possesses the collective power to reshape its future and demand a safe, dry, and hopeful tomorrow.
