In the Ether...

In 2007 I was exploring technology's role as a mediator of interaction. One idea from this time was to weave with network cable. I proposed installing the weave as an integrated and functional part of the infrastructure of a building, some text from the proposal...

'My ideas stem from an interest in the innate and engineered similarities between man and machine and what it means to be human in a technologically homogenised world. In particular how our convergence with technology as a means to communicate and interact effects how we construct our idea of self....

With advice from network engineer Daniel Barella and independent curator and creator of the Open Source Embroidery project Ele Carpenter, I have developed a data fabric. This fabric is woven, using a homemade loom and network cable as a data thread, allowing safe transfer of information through the cable with no interference to the signal strength... Network cable is responsible for forming a connections, transferring data - the blood of the machine. I would like to propose incorporating the data fabric into the architectural fabric of the building, splicing it into the network, into the existing structure, beneath the surface. Fusing the ancient art of weaving with modern technological applications, the work becomes an integrated part of the system with functional as well as aesthetic properties.'

Though these ideas were never fully realised Ele Carpenter has continued to show a swatch of the work as part of the Open Source Embroidery project, exploring the interconnectedness of craft and code. This evolving body of work has led to her undertaking residencies with Isis Arts, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK; Access Space, Sheffield, UK and currently with HUMlab, Umea University, Sweden. And to showings for the Ether (Swatch) as part of Open Source Embroidery: Craft + Code at furtherfields's HTTP gallery, London, and at the HUMlab Syjunta, Sweden.

Images of the creation of the Ether (Swatch):


Images from the recent HUMlab Syjunta show in Umea, Sweden, acting as a conduit to transfer Ian Clarke's web based work PHP Embroidery onto the screen:

Grimmer&Steele Trust - Sessions at Proximity Effect, Plymouth Arts Centre

Are you a victim of your own over complicated emotional life?

The Grimmer & Steele Trust can help to provide you with a remedy.

We specialise in care enforcement, and can offer you a free perceptual augmentation session with the Trusts well-balanced carers. The session will provide you with a positive personalised package of sensory respite and reaffirmation - designed with you in mind.

Make yourself comfortable, relax and watch this...

Proximity Effect - The Grimmer & Steele Trust will help you to feel good about you!

Press Release -

29 November 2008 – 11 January 2009

You are invited to the opening event
Friday 28 November, 6.30–8.30pm
The exhibition opens with demanding performance by Leo Devlin curated by Red Ape, arm wrestling by Ray White and a performance by guests the Grimmer & Steele Trust, heralding the start of this daring programme.
ArtsMatrix and Plymouth Arts Centre are also supporting three artist-led projects in the city of Plymouth: Pilot, U:1 studios and new work by Café Concrete.

Exhibition
29 November 2008 – 11 January 2009
A series of performances, installations, videos and live music by visual artists from the city of Plymouth. The group is brought together for the first time, each with their own individual practice and curatorial experience, to consider the effect of their proximity to the city and each other.

Low Profile embark on a marathon performance: watching the entire 1st series of hit 1980s TV show MacGyver, back-to-back, cataloguing numerous ways of saving the day: rolling under doors, escaping burning buildings and fooling the guards.

Rooting contemporary music to locality and heritage, onec have invited bands and musicians to interpret songs of the sea for a compilation LP. Ray White creates an arm-wrestling forum in the galleries, alongside a relaxation room by the Grimmer & Steele Trust. Nick Grew, in collaboration with Heidi C Morstang, presents a new films, Grain Silo, featuring the erstwhile relic of Plymouth’s skyline. Marianne Torrance continues her research with people who share her passion for ecology, exploring art and marine science collaborations, in partnership with the Marine Biological Association and Plymouth City Council. Red Ape is an enquiry into the relationship between language and live performance. Curated by Mark Greenwood, the project explores issues around male identity and anxieties.

Curator Paula Orrell explains: "We have offered a selected group of artists the opportunity to curate/develop an exhibition in collaboration with Plymouth Arts Centre. The objective is to develop a critical space for the artists to examine their own context and offer up a broader understanding of their work. It encourages exchange and development of links between artists in the region, country and beyond, considering the current climate of the visual arts and the development of audience and profile within the city of Plymouth."

Interference

A quick update on the progression of ideas for the Triparks residency, more information on the blog.

I have been exploring the similarities between the body and the landscape, looking at thresholds and boundaries in particular. I am interested in the idea of the landscape as a
timeless wilderness and the body's transience within this landscape. Viewing the body as a viral agent, attempting to infect, affect, manipulate or assert control over the landscape. I have also been thinking about ideas of isolation and (personal) space, with areas of the national park being amongst the most remote in England.

With the video work I want to locate some of the most remote areas of the park and shoot some footage there. I want to capture some really slow 360 degree panoramic landscape shots, so you can hardly notice the landscape moving or changing. I might film in HD as the landscape itself is so finely detailed. Alongside this I want to capture or sample scientific footage of the body, both internal and external, perhaps looking at bruising, fingerprints, sperm, viruses. What I plan to do is introduce these bodily elements into the landscape in various ways as if they are faults in the film - lens flares, distortions or interruptions, quite pronounced but
abstract.