International furniture retail giant Ikea is set to commission multi-million pound contemporary artworks for public viewing as part of a Moscow-based development due to open in 2012. The development in Moscow will be only the first of many mixed-use spaces across Ikea sites, beginning with Russia. Major contemporary artists such as Piotr Uklanski, Jeppe Hein and Jim Lambie, have been invited to participate.

“The new building will be totally different to what’s there now,” said Simon Dance, the owner of a London-based architecture, interior and product design firm who has been working on this effort with the Swedish mega-brand for the past few years.

In line with Ikea’s aim to create a better everyday life for people, Dance says, “The idea is to create a day out, somewhere people want to spend time, especially in Moscow where it takes so long to get anywhere because the traffic is so bad.” Dance also says that mixed-use space will fuse commerce, culture and leisure, stressing that the commissioned works of art are a key part of their vision.

Ikea is known around the world for its affordable, modern furniture and other innovative products for the home. The company is also known to have strict and somewhat unusual franchising rules that pertain to the spaces where items are showcased.

The “airport-sized” development in Moscow will be at the 260,000 sq. m Mega Teply Stan retail park. One of the proposed artworks is a 300m mirror labyrinth that is 24m in height, a large-scale iron sculpture, which will be viewable from the 16-lane motorway that runs alongside the Moscow site, and a new version of Secret Affair, 2007 – one of the works that inspired the entire project.

Commissioned public art is an excellent way to expose people to culture, while providing artists with the resources that they need to create on a large scale.

View a previously written post by Mouli Cohen about Arts and Culture.