Background
In September 2021 artists were invited to submit an expression of interest for a project to design a permanent tribute to Dame Agatha Christie. The tribute is being entirely funded and developed through the Towns Fund and will be installed as part of the harbour renewal and improvement scheme.
Artists and creative practitioners had until 18 October to send us their ideas. In total, 14 artists responded to the public call out. The final five artists were selected by a panel made up of representatives from Torbay Council, Agatha Christie Ltd, the International Agatha Christie Festival Ltd, Torbay Culture and Torquay Town Board. The panel assessed each submission on how it ‘captured the spirit of Agatha Christie, her Life and Work’.
The five shortlisted artists were asked to present their idea to the public in a short video, all of which were made available on the Council’s website with a link to the voting form.
The vote was promoted in local media, on the council’s social media and One Torbay and via partners e.g., Agatha Christie Ltd and Torbay Culture Board.
Voting Form
In order to ensure fairness when choosing a winning artist, the council sought ways to limit the votes received to one per person. The on-line vote was carried out using Microsoft Forms software. However, to try and ensure that each person voted only once an email address was captured in order to verify each vote made.
The public vote ran from 14 December 2021 to 16 January 2022.
Analysis of votes
After the closing date, analysis of the votes was carried out to ensure as far as possible that only one vote per person was counted.
The final count of votes (post analysis) does not include:
- Votes where the same email address was given for more than one vote for the same artist (one vote counted)
- Votes where the same email address was given for votes for different artists (no vote counted)
- Votes where no email address was given (no vote counted)
- Votes for the same artist which have different email addresses containing the same name (one vote counted)
The final count of votes (post analysis) does include:
- Votes where an email address with two names e.g. Agatha&Max@email.com were submitted twice (one vote for each excluding any further votes with that email address)
- Email addresses where the @ has been missed out but was otherwise an email address format
- Family email addresses which are similar names to other email addresses e.g. Christie.family@email.com and Agatha.Christie@email.com (one vote for each excluding any duplicates of either email address)
Results of the vote pre and post analysis
The table below shows the number of votes submitted for each artist before and after the above analysis had been carried out.
| Artist | Number of votes cast (pre analysis) | Count of votes (post analysis) |
|---|---|---|
| Elisabeth Hadley | 1,867 | 1,705 |
| Hazel Reeves | 549 | 515 |
| David A Annand | 445 | 396 |
| Yorkshire Fine Arts / The Lost Foundry Devon | 343 | 307 |
| Gordon Young | 178 | 165 |
| Total | 3,382 | 3,088 |