FABRICA AT THE VICTORIA AND ALBERT MUSEUM IN LONDON

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FABRICA AT THE VICTORIA AND ALBERT MUSEUM IN LONDON

The two interactive art installations Venetian Mirror and Exquisite Clock are part of the V&A’s exhibition “Decode: Digital Design Sensations”, from 8 December 2009 to 11 April 2010

Fabrica, December 2009. Fabrica has been invited to participate in “Decode: Digital Design Sensations” a major survey of the best contemporary digital art and design from around the world, opening in December 2009 at the V&A in London. Decode is an exhibition curated by the prestigious London institution and the leading digital arts organization onedotzero.

Venetian Mirror is a large scale interactive installation blending contemporary digital technology with traditional Venetian glass. When the visitor walks up to the installation, their image doesn’t immediately appear in the mirror. Only if they keep very still, will the reflection slowly appear, like a photograph being developed. The combination of high tech and traditional design invites the audience to reflect on the duality of new and old, and the mystery of time itself. It is an interactive piece which engages the sense of proprioceptivity - the sense of oneself and one’s body, in the here-and-now. The cut of the glass pieces resemble a broken mirror - an allusion to the fragility of time. Venetian Mirror is by Andy Cameron and Sam Baron with Oriol Ferrer Mesia, Goncalo Campos and Dave Towey.

Exquisite Clock is a clock made of numbers taken from everyday life – seen, captured and uploaded by people from all over the world. Built around an online database, the clock exists as a web 2.0 website, an iPhone application and as a series of site specific installations. The V&A Exquisite Clock is a hanging sculpture of deconstructed computers, screens and cables which visitors are invited to contribute to and interact with. Exquisite Clock is by Joao Wilbert. iPhone development is by Steven Baughman.

The inclusion of Venetian Mirror and Exquisite Clock in this major exhibition is the recognition of Fabrica’s role in exploring new approaches to the creative use of technology, and puts the creative laboratory of Benetton firmly at the centre of the most exciting, innovative and creative developments taking place in the arts and design today.

Decode also features the work of two well known artists who have taken their first steps at Fabrica: We Feel Fine by Jonathan Harris was first shown in ‘I’ve Been Waiting for You’, a Fabrica group show of interactive and relational art at the Triad, Seoul as part of the Seoul Biennale in 2006. It data mines expressions of personal emotion taken from anonymous blogs and displays them as colourful clouds of floating text. The Replenishing Body by Ross Phillips is an award winning interactive video installation in which the viewer is invited to put themselves into the picture. An earlier version of this work titled ‘VideoGrid’ was part of the Fabrica show DARE at the Museum of the Moving Image, New York in 2003.

Editors Notes

Decode: Digital Design Sensations shows the latest developments in digital and interactive design, from small screen based graphics to large-scale installations. There are works by established international artists and designers including Daniel Brown, Golan Levin and Daniel Rozin as well as emerging designers such as Troika and Simon Heijdens. Decode: Digital Design Sensations is in partnership with SAP.

The V&A is the world’s greatest museum of art and design with collections unrivalled in their scope and diversity. It was established to make works of art available to all and to inspire British designers and manufacturers. Today, the V&A’s collections which span over 2000 years of human creativity in virtually every medium and from many parts of the world, continue to intrigue, inspire and inform.

You can see the project card here: http://www.fabrica.it/project/fabrica-victoria-and-albert-museum

For more information:

Fabrica Press Office

+39-0422-516272

mliverot@benetton.it

www.fabrica.it

V&A Press Office

Zoe Franklin

+44-0-20-7942 2497

www.vam.ac.uk