Blackout - architecture, warfare and noise
A project by Disinformation

Across the British landscape are scattered thousands of abandoned
military installations, from pill-boxes to former nuclear bunkers,
structures above and below ground that are now redundant architectural
legacies of a century of conflict. This month sees the launch of an
interactive artwork made by Disinformation in response to some of these
structures. Titled Blackout, the project is to be exhibited in galleries
and on the internet, opening on MONDAY 18 OCTOBER at the Broadway Media
Centre, Broad Street, Nottingham and at http://www.blackout.org.uk.

Blackout marks the end of a century during which technological
innovation and the brutalities of war have gone hand in hand.

Like immersion in darkness, experiences of danger place individuals in
heightened states of physical awareness. The nervous system increases
its sensitivity to a broad range of environmental information. Through
military research and development, this simple fact of animal psychology
assumes concrete form.

The evolving technology of early warning systems has extended human
perceptions dramatically in terms of distance, subtlety and bandwidth.
But with the onset of tactical or technical obsolescence, these devices
are abandoned or dismantled. Blackout uses photography, video, virtual
reality, sound and text to allow viewers to explore the architecture and
atmosphere of a number of such installations.

Blackout is exhibited from:
Monday 18 to Saturday 23 October, 3-9pm. Admission free
Broadway Media Centre, Broad Street, Nottingham, UK.

and

Wednesday 10 to Saturday 13 November, 11am - 5pm. Admission free
Waygood Gallery, 2nd Floor, 39 High Bridge, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK.
+ Special Events:-
Opening event with sound installation by Disinformation, Tuesday 9
November
7 - 9pm, Waygood Gallery
Discussion with Joe Banks of Disinformation and Nick McCamley, author of
Secret Underground Cities, Thursday 10 November at 7pm, Fine Art Lecture
Theatre, The Quadrangle, University of Newcastle.

Blackout is available for further exhibition during 2000.

Produced by David Metcalfe Associates in collaboration with Artec,
Northern Architecture and Now Ninety9. Funded by the Arts Council of
England and Northern Arts.

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Forthcoming DMA Projects :
for information only - not for publication
[Blackout - Disinformation]
Available for exhibition throughout 2000. Please see above details.

[Over Easy - Simon Herbert + Alan Read]
A publication about Richard Wilson’s first permanent sculptural work
produced by DMA for Arc Arts Centre in Stockton-on-Tees, UK. The book
places the work into the wider contexts of Wilson’s inspirations,
influences and past works, as well as discussing the processes and
problematics of artist-architect collaborations.
Published by Black Dog Publishing, November 1999. ISBN 1 901033 71 6

[Heresy - Fiona Wright and Ben Ponton]
The final project in Hidden, a year-long series of site-specific art
works commissioned by DMA and Globe Gallery, North Shields, UK. The
central theme of the works has been the interaction between the “public”
and the “private” in those communal or civic spaces that are a part of
everyone’s life. (Previous works in this programme have occupied a
former Registry Office, the Childhood Memories Toy Museum and 2 million
tickets across the Metro rail network on Tyneside).

Heresy is a performance work devised for the pedestrian tunnel under the
River Tyne. It is a collaboration between performance/dance artist Fiona
Wright and sound artist Ben Ponton, founder member of :zoviet*france: 18
& 19 December 1999, [to be confirmed].

[Ryoji Ikeda / :zoviet*france: tour]
This multi-media concert tour is a double-bill of high quality
electronic music. Ryoji Ikeda’s use of sine waves, pure tones, clicks
and hums makes a sparse but beautiful new music from electronic sources.
His performance is accompanied by intense imagery created with video
projection and lighting. He is best known as a member of the Japanese
performance group dumb type and has recently installed a new work at the
Millennium Dome, Greenwich, UK.

:zoviet*france: create richly textural music from electronic and
acoustic sources. Their improvised performances owe more to the Indian
raga tradition than to improvised jazz, creating an immersive experience
for the audience. Their performances will be accompanied by an abstract
video work commissioned from Ravi Deepres. Titled still.moving, this
will be released subsequently as a DVD single and will be available for
exhibition/screenings.

The tour opens at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, London on Tuesday 18 January
00, then continues to Saturday 29 January. Further details at
http://www.cmntours.org.uk

still.moving will be released on DVD in late March 00. Both projects
produced by DMA.


For further information on any of these projects please e-mail
[log in to unmask] or telephone +44 (0)191 230 4646

APOLOGIES FOR ANY INAPPROPRIATE OR CROSS-POSTING!

--
david metcalfe associates
PO Box 637, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE99 1JF, England
Telephone +44 (0)191 230 4646
E-mail [log in to unmask]
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