Zoe Irvine, Dan Belasco Rogers
Helen Cole, Tanuja Amarasuriya (Arnolfini)
Constance Fleuriot, Richard Hull, Phil Stenton, Hans Danaan, Stuart Martin (Mobile Bristol)

Mobile Bristol and Arnolfini commissioned two artists, Zoe Irvine and Dan Belasco Rogers, to create interactive work to explore some of the potential of Mobile Bristol software, appliances and infrastructure. The R&D commissions have allowed the artists to begin to investigate this emerging and experimental technology and its relevance to their own practice, as well as to feedback into the design process of Mobile Bristol’s pervasive technology.

The resulting works-in-progress from this R&D phase are both located in Queen Square, an area near Bristol’s harbourside and Arnolfini.

Description of the two projects:
Both Zoe and Dan used kit consisting of ipaq+gps unit to enable the ‘viewer’ to access located audio as they moved around the outdoor space. With Zoe’s piece the screen was hidden, in Dan’s the screen displayed images to draw the users attention to a particular location.

Daniel Belasco Rogers: A description of this place as if you were someone else

As you walk down a street, do you wonder if it can remember everything that happened on it? Can bricks and mortar really record sound vibrations from the past and if so would you be able to hear yourself? A description of this place as if you were someone else is an exploration into siting personal histories in geographical locations such as Queen Square, to form the tapestry of experience, and how the viewer can use the technology to peel back the city's layers, revealing those personal stories of first kisses and car crashes.

Zoe Irvine: Moulinex

This piece takes as its points of departure the filmic sensation of using a walkman and Queen Square’s recent history as a venue for open air cinema screenings. The viewer of the work navigates the physical landscape in which there are lingering fragments of film soundtracks which have both been shown there; the Matrix and Moulin Rouge. As the viewer/listener first walks around the soundscape it takes the form of an auditory archaeological dig but as the viewer moves further the sounds begin to merge and transform taking on ideas of DJ culture and plunderphonics.

Both works were shown to an invited audience in February 2004, and it is still possible to view them by prior appointment (email constance).

The Mobile Bristol forum includes space to discuss Zoe and Dan’s work.

Both artists intend to continue to use the Mobile Bristol software to develop their work in a variety of locations.