Our piece ‘Where Are They Now?’ is now available to stream and download on The Listening Booth (click >here< to check it out and all the other great auditory works).
We attended Yuri Pattison’s private view at Chisenhale Gallery last night which turned out to be very good show. He has completely transformed the huge exhibition space into this eerie, office-aesthetic-but-clearly-not-functional, sort of environment. This was intensified by the blinking strip lights and wiring fans. All the objects utilised were very striped back, such as computers without with no outer shell, wires and circuit boards spilling out onto the floors and surfaces. Everything felt very ‘in progress’; like wondering out of a lift on the 6th floor of a company building during construction. The industrial nature of the materials confirmed this link architectural link. A very thoughtful touch was the door to the Chisenhale office, which is in the corner of the gallery space, was left a jar. A comment is then being made about the comparison between this artificial working space, which is being exhibited, and then an authentic working space, which might only be noticed if visitors ventured to every crevice of the space. Something that amused us was the presence of a bitcoin mining rig that monitors online transactions and accumulates small amounts of capital. However this is not just for show; Pattison has made a series of new sculptures that contain active elements, which have been installed at sites across east London including, Second Home, a workhub for creative companies; Campus London, a Google space for London’s start-up community; and London Hackspace. So these objects weren’t born with the white walls of a gallery in mind, quite the opposite. There are also some beautiful films of, seemingly, abandoned of workplace-like situations which are so haunting and still that at first we thought they might be CGI but they’re filmed on tracks which is what gives it the ghostly feel. The fact that it was the private view definitely gave it a different atmosphere (obviously) but we’re very much attracted to how the character of the space would change if it were a more isolated experience.
