Chromatic Aberration

Chromatic Aberration is a film installation which explores the early technologies of colour filmmaking drawn from the archives of George Eastman House, Rochester, New York. Featuring vibrant close-ups of eyes from fledgling archival experiments in colour film, Chromatic Aberration turns the cinematic lens in on itself: from the prosthetic recording eye of the camera, to an evocation of the abstract inner screen of one's eyelids. Early 1920s colour film footage - mainly tests shots featuring members of George Eastman's family as well as Hollywood stars of the time - is shot in such a way so as to reveal the inherent chromatic fringing, distortion and misalignment. Using specialist equipment at the BFI National Archive, London, the footage is reworked through the use of extreme close-up and magnification, honing in on the eyes. The installation evokes an imagined abstract colour world, a flickering eyelid trapped in a mechanical peephole. Exhibitions: Solo exhibition as film installation at Tyneside Cinema (Newcastle, Oct-Nov 2014); Solo exhibition at George Eastman Museum (Rochester, New York, Jan-April 2015), including a second work on display. Film festivals nominations for competitions: Winner of Best Vanguard Film Competition in Lima Independiente International Film Festival (Peru). Nominations: Filmadrid festival (Spain); Curtas Vila do Conde film festival (Portugal); Festival du Nouveau Cinema (Canada); Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival (Czech Republic ); International Film Festival Bratislava (Slovenia). Additional screenings at International Rotterdam Film Festival (Netherlands); European Media Art Festival (Germany); BFI London Film Festival (UK); Mini-retrospective screening at DIM CINEMA, The Cinematheque (Vancouver May 2015). Reviews and interviews in Artforum, The Wire Magazine, After Image, Studio International. Public lectures: with Prof. Sarah Street at Tyneside Cinema (Nov 2014); Royal Academy visiting public lecture (Nov 2014); ‘The Laughter of Things’ symposium, International Film Festival Rotterdam and Piet Zwart Institute (Jan 2015); George Eastman Museum and Rochester University (April 2015). Acquired by the George Eastman Museum for their collection.

Exploring the Roles of Technology and Social Play in Art Museums

This co-written chapter was included in an edited book featuring invited authors from different countries and different areas of museum research and practice. The chapter uses a theory of play by Johan Huizinga (1938) to frame case studies of play-based interactive experiences in museums in various countries. The aim was to use theory to ground museum practice, in order to evaluate existing practical implementations as well as to inform the design of new ones. The book was nominated as one of the 10 best museum education books of 2011 by Museum Education Monitor, and the chapter led to a subsequent technology residency the author undertook in the Spike Island gallery, Bristol in 2012, funded by the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts, Arts and Humanities Research Council and Arts Council England. It also informed his subsequent postgraduate teaching, an example of which is a recent MA project, which deconstructs play from a computational perspective. Collaborations have continued with the co-author, which have resulted in a number of invited lectures. In this chapter the authors explore play as a structure for supporting visitor learning, drawing from international research in museums and interaction design. Four aspects of play first proposed by Huizinga are explored – the free-choice aspect of play, play as distinct from real life, play as an ordering structure, and the role of play in bridging communities. The chapter argues that play provides museums with ready-made structures and concepts, which can help planning for visitor learning. The research was equally divided between the co-authors, who developed the conceptual and theoretical aspects of the article by drawing on their own research alongside key examples of museum design and digital media.

A series of performances in 'Translating Reviews from 1990: Art Forum'

Participation in group exhibition themed around the 25th anniversary of the Elba Benitez Gallery in Madrid. My work comprised a series of performances in which I translated reviews from the magazine Art Forum from 1990. The performances took place in various locations in London, throughout the run of the exhibition, and were streamed live to an iPad in the gallery in Madrid. I made audio visual recordings of the performances via the streaming media, which located me as the performer alongside the viewers in a single split image. These recordings were then archived in a shared folder held between the gallery and me, and which visitors to the exhibition could access when a performance was not taking place. The work extends my concerns with translation and performance, and with a consideration of how the mechanism of the gallery and the exhibition might be used to generate innovative viewing engagements facilitated by technology. The work also attempts to develop thinking and practice around the relationship between art works and their documentation - in this case the documentation and even its potential for distribution is generated as the work comes into being. The exhibition included works by Ignasi Aballí, Armando Andrade Tudela,Lothar Baumgarten, Carlos Bunga, Cabello/Carceller, Juan Cruz, Gintaras Didžiapetris, Fernanda Fragateiro, Hreinn Fridfinnsson, Carlos Garaicoa,Mario García Torres, David Goldblatt, Cristina Iglesias,Ana Mendieta, Vik Muniz, Ernesto Neto, Francisco Ruiz de Infante,Alexander Sokurov, Francesc Torres and Valentín Vallhonrat.