The new Rootstein Hopkins Parade Ground. Courtesy University of the Arts London

Anish Kapoor CBE officially opened London’s newest exhibition space on July 2 2008 at the Parade Ground site at Chelsea College of Art and Design, part of University of the Arts London.

The 3,500 square metre area on the Millbank campus next to Tate Britain has been dubbed ‘the gallery without walls’ but was officially renamed the Rootstein Hopkins Parade Ground at the opening event on Wednesday evening.

The new name is in recognition of the £1.5 m gift given by the Rootstein Hopkins Foundation to enable the college to develop the site. The foundation has previously funded the Rootstein Hopkins Space at another University of the Arts London college, the London College of Fashion.

“The strength of the Rootstein Hopkins Foundation has always been supporting individual artists,” said Deidre Hopkins, Trustee of the Rootstein Hopkins Foundation “This arts space offers opportunities to so many artists, and for so many different types of exhibition – not just sculpture, but fine art, design works, audio and visual installations.”

The initial programme of exhibitions at the former Royal Army Medical Corps parade ground includes installation work by Brazilian conceptual artist Cildo Meireles who is known for his fascination with scale. The work on display here will give a taster of what will be on offer when his retrospective show opens in October at Tate Modern.

Also on display in the first few weeks, at what is Europe’s largest open-air exhibition space, will be Perplexed in Public, an installation by Italian artist, Lara Favaretto and Speeds of Time a sound-sculpture installation by Bill Fontana.

Courtesy University of the Arts London.

(Above - l to r) Sir John Tusa, Chairman of the University of the Arts London and Chelsea College of Art and Design alumni Alan Rickman and Anish Kapoor.

It heralds what promises to be an new era for public art – one that Anish Kapoor hopes will lead to some bold new work. “I hope that what we see on the Parade Ground will be a move away from the whimsical (in public art) towards the symbolic,” said the Turner Prize winning sculptor.

Chelsea College of Art and Design's fine art post-graduate students will also be showing in the newly designated and redesigned space.

“It will be interesting to see how students will use the space,” added Zoe Ellsmore, press officer at University of the Arts London. “Students have been using the Parade Ground for a few years but it will be fascinating to see how they will stage their work in this newly landscaped space.”

“During the BA show in June this year, one Fine Art student built an extraordinary mechanical moving arm that moved across the Parade Ground. It was a very bold confident piece of large scale public work - from an undergraduate student. The College and University would certainly like to see more work like this in the space.”

Entry to the area will be free and it is anticipated that over 1 million people a year will visit and experience what is on offer. Landscape architects Planet Earth were given the brief to make the space as open as possible, reducing boundaries and barriers to public and community participation.

In this regard, the college hopes the Rootstein Hopkins Parade Ground will become established as an artistic destination on a par with Tate Britain, Tate Modern and the V&A. They aim to achieve this by maintaining a programme of events and installations 'on a monumental scale'.

As well as focusing on using the space to present works of great size, Sir John Tusa, Chairman of the University of the Arts London, says that the variety of what will be on offer is also important.

“The unique space has the flexibility to stage the work of artists and designers from a massive range of subject disciplines, spanning everything from sculpture to design and audio and architecture installations,” said Sir John.

While the name and status of the space is new, the area has already been used recently to accommodate large-scale installations. Most recently, Chris Burden’s flying steamroller occupied the space last October as part of South London Gallery’s exhibition of his work. The college aims to continue such collaborations with other arts venues.