'Bedsitter and Chair' 2009-10 'Removed from the Eyes of Strangers' London Umea Sweden, Copenhagen Demark.
'The Bedsitter and The Chair' were and are mechanical artworks based on the idea of human surrogates. I have loved the thought of what artificial life might constitute within the ways we alter our own bodies and of the ways in which we transfer ourselves and our skins onto our own environments.
Often in my practice surrogate bodies will take on the roles of their Human counterparts Such forms as Mannequin limbs, Chairs, Matresses and Beds assisted by electronic motors and timers will start to echo human like attributes through performing simple repetitive motions. Never really ever stepping out of routine, but always following the same old pre-destined pattern step by step.
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Wailing Wall, 2007 Dizzy Heights, Airspace Gallery. Stoke-on-Trent.
The 'Wailing Wall' was a mixed media artwork that I shared the privilige of exhibiting as one of two Artists involved in the re-opening of Airspace Gallery on Broad Street in Hanley.
Both mechanical elements and voice elements were incorporated into this artwork based on thoughts of what if there were souls within a wall, calling but not being heard. There are many walls throughout the world, some act as barriers, some are religous, other are relics of past life's. All tell stories of peoples live's mostly forgotten, but what if some sort of echo of their presence remained, some small remnant of their existance was still to heard if you listened hard enough.
In this way I suppose I was looking for my way of suggesting a form of ghost echo that is there but not percieved. a person may have been there but is no longer percieved, you don't notice their echo but it may still be there.
Wailing Wall Images by Darren Washington.
