Lightform Lab residency + projecting onto grass
TLDR: Let artists experiment with cool hardware and software more often pls.
For the past couple of weeks I’ve been part of a group residency through The Old Market Theatre, Lightform Lab, where we’ve had the opportunity to develop wellbeing-related projects using large-scale projection mapping led by artist Thomas Buckley. For the final day, we had a few hours in the theatre space to try out our ideas, with each artist bringing such varied concepts.
Before I talk about the residency work, I wanted to say how vital residencies like this are for artists. Not just being able to access high-tech equipment, but paid time to try things out, make mistakes and accidental discoveries is hard to come by. Being able to spend full days in my studio over the past couple of weeks has allowed me to learn new skills, meet other artists and follow new threads of thinking, and without funding, most artists are working in 2 or more jobs and squeezing in project time alongside finding income that covers our (rapidly increasing) rent and bills.
‘Structurally F*cked’ is the recent inquiry into the dire state of artist income by Artists Network. If you’re an artist this inquiry probably isn’t telling you anything you don’t already know, but it’s really worth a read. They advocate the introduction of Universal Basic Income- which honestly seems like some kind of utopian dream in the current political climate, but we can dream- and make suggestions for artists to take forward:
“1: Join a union
2: Keep an artist’s time diary
3: Protect yourself with a contract
4: Stop performing success and working for free, and keep speaking out about bad experiences”
(For dark comedic effect, the radio station playing as I type this is playing a series of songs about money, concluding with ‘Money’ from Cabaret. Very droll, FIP Radio.)
Getting back to the work then, and how might a digital walk look as a 360 degree projection? How would it make viewers feel? As ‘Walking in Valhalla’ began as a project to be streamed online, finding ways to bring it to a ‘real’ space, with a small group of people physically present in the room presented a new challenge. I toyed with the idea of a large-scale livestream but ultimately that wasn’t possible within the space with the time and resources available. I instead wanted to see how the footage I already had recorded might work on a large scale physically.
I created a short film using direct footage from my walks in the game, edited with After Effects to include text prompts and to give the landscape a more dreamy quality. I also added overlayed footage of my hands, posed to mimic the way you can sometimes see your ‘hands’ when playing first person open world games.
The film ended with a projection of the walk on my own feet, as a subtle nod to how the project began- with foot pain from arthritis.
With software like MadMapper et al, the creative possibilities for artists to use projections and other digital presentation techniques are endlessly exciting. I’m reminded of the 2016 ‘Dr Blighty’ projections that literally stopped traffic. (I remember watching from a nearby traffic island, surrounded by beeping, angry drivers!) My hope is that more venues/galleries with access to this kind of software & hardware make it more accessible to artists from all backgrounds to work with, in the same way that The Old Market has opened its doors with these experimental residencies. It’s a stark contrast to the trend of ‘immersive’ exhibitions (including the £25 per ticket Van Gogh one coming to Brighton for the May Festival) and the problems with them are covered really well in this Vice magazine article.
Before projecting on these enormous walls, I spent some time in the studio projecting on a foot by foot sized piece of turf. Projections- small or large- are difficult to capture on an iPhone but here’s some of the results:
I did a few more projection experiments with a dress and on some shoes too, (see below.) I’ve had to return the Lightform projector to TOM for now, but a projector is certainly one of the things going on my DYCP application- crossed fingers!
Last weeks’ walk we went through the Forest of Dean, Puzzlewood, and then went on to climb a nearby mountain that turned out to be the Stiperstones in Shropshire. There were quite a few people along for the walk this week, which was great. I’ve uploaded the walk to Youtube, should you want to watch it back (its the first time I’ve returned to OBS for a stream in a while, so it includes my face!)
We passed a few NPCs (Non Player Characters) chatting away in various languages, which meant we talked a lot about Medieval languages in the stream. Wired did this great write up of the linguistics of AC: Valhalla, for those interested in such things.
There’s no walk this week as I have a prior engagement, but I shall return the following week (more details to come in an update here on my substack).
Resources
https://www.thomas-buckley.com/
https://static.a-n.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Structurally-F%E2%80%93cked.pdf
https://www.artistsunionengland.org.uk/
http://www.shropshiresgreatoutdoors.co.uk/route/shropshire-way-circular-walk-2-stiperstones/
https://www.wired.com/story/assassins-creed-valhalla-linguistic-guide/