Journey of discovery through art during ‘ tough year’
A TRIPTYCH of installations under the banner of “Human Nature” come together to form the centrepiece of York Mediale 2020.
The international media arts festival kicks off at York Art Gallery today, with a film by Kelly Richardson, with hundreds of tiny drones dancing around like fireflies under a centuriesold tree. There is also a new commission from one of the world’s leading immersive art collectives, Marshmallow Laser Feast, which follows the journey of oxygen from lungs to the heart and body and animations by fine artist Rachel Goodyear, exploring the psyche and the subconscious via symbolic creatures like wolves.
It has been a tough year for the Mediale, which had to radically reshape this year because of Covid- 19. But creative director Tom Higham said they were pleased to have been able to get new work made in Yorkshire.
He said: “We had 19 or 20 projects that we were developing up to February, then the world changed and we lost quite a bit of funding and some venues had to close. We lost some partnerships that we were developing and we had to revisit everything and look at the projects we could do. The shape of it had to fundamentally change.
“I am really proud that we managed to make a set of projects that are safe and high quality and a good opportunity to have some different cultural experiences.”
Good Neighbours – a walking tour with a difference – is another commission from the Mediale, from today until Sunday. Using live performance, surveillance technology and chatbot messaging on their phones walkers set out an “entertaining and provocative” journeyround Layerthorpe, York.
The Mediale is an independent arts charity founded in 2014 to celebrate the designation of York as the UK’s first and only Unesco Creative City of Media Arts. The first festival took place in 2018.