Turner Prize winner Jasleen Kaur has announced her first permanent public artwork, titled *Was.Is.Will.Be*, to be unveiled on 28 November at Southmere Lake in Cygnet Square, Thamesmead, southeast London. The sculpture is funded by housing association Peabody and was selected with input from a creative studio that includes five local residents, among them filmmaker Comfort Adeneye and painter Gonzalo Fuentes. Other project partners include Studio Danmole, Company, Place, and youth culture specialist Joseph Gray. The work incorporates fragments of local conversation and features the phrase 'horses are here' written in the sky.
This commission matters because it marks a significant shift for Kaur, known for her immersive, politically charged installations, into permanent public art within a community undergoing major redevelopment. Thamesmead, originally a 1960s Brutalist housing project and the setting for Stanley Kubrick's *A Clockwork Orange*, has become a site for ambitious cultural placemaking through Peabody's strategy, which has also included works by Bob and Roberta Smith and Ackroyd & Harvey. Kaur's involvement brings national attention to the area and underscores the role of contemporary art in regeneration, while her selection process—centering local voices—offers a model for community-engaged public art.