Recorders is the current exhibition running at Manchester Art Gallery until January 2011. Featuring the artwork of Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, its also part of
Abandon Normal Devices, and featuring several world and European premieres of new work by the artist. Since preview night, I've been back to see the show on a number of occasions to re-experience the show at different times.
After walking past the rather ominous “By entering this exhibition the visitor gives their consent to be recorded by a range of surveillance technologies and for this data to become an integral part of the works of art”, you are greeted by the sight of a giant fingerprint.
Pulse Index invites visitors to insert a finger (and not your big toe as I witnessed one person trying to do) and to have it scanned and added to the display of 580 previous participants. This leads to a common theme of all the pieces – the use of technology to demonstrating the co-existing similarities and differences by which individuals are identified.
There’s a playfulness to many of the pieces -
Please Empty Your Pockets invites the visitor to do just that, placing everyday items upon a conveyor belt to be converted by a digital scanner into a ghostly rolling collage of 600,000 objects. There’s also the aptly-named
Microphones, which features a circle of vintage microphones into which visitors speak or sing a short message followed by a previously recorded message played back to them.
Pulse Room is a favourite of mine. In one corner of a large room dotted with a field of light-bulbs, two hand-held sensors measure your heartbeat before displaying in the form of the light-bulb flashing. At quieter times you can sit in the room by yourself in contemplation of the heartbeats as they flicker overhead when suddenly, the room will fade to black as another is added to the collection. You can find an interesting piece on
BLDG BLOG about this particular artwork.
The exhibition runs until Sunday, January 30th 2011. For more information, please visit the
Manchester Art Gallery website. For more information about the artist, I suggest his
comprehensive personal website.
Rafael Lozano-Hemmer
Pulse Index (2010)
Close Up (2006)
Close Up (2006)
Please Empty Your Pockets (2010)
33 Questions per Minute (2000)
Pulse Room (2006)
People on People (2010)
