Digital responses

Digital Responses was an artists programme and live project, held at the Victoria and Albert Museum in 2002, for which Paul Coldwell was the Curator and Principal Investigator. Barbara Rauch’s contribution was both as co-curator, selecting and co-ordinating the presentations of nineteen artists, and as invited artist, producing a specifically made piece for this event ('tête-à-tête') with Liz Chandler of TwoWay Television.

‘Digital Responses’ took the form of a series of presentations by 19 artists/researchers (including Coldwell and Rauch) from eleven UK Higher Education institutions, in gallery 70 of the V&A. As part of a monthly changing programme, each participant was invited to produce a new piece of work, inspired by the V&A collection, and using some aspect of new technology in its making. In addition, each was required to present a display case referencing this connection to the collection and an art path, which led the viewer back into the museum to source further key works as selected by the artist.

This live project represented a radical change for the V&A, requiring the gallery to be wired for the internet and the installation of a specifically designed flexible exhibition system by Chris Hutton, which allowed for rapid turn-around, and to embrace work ranging from projections through to sculptural works.

The project received creative sponsorship from ‘Gallery Systems/Keep Thinking’ with whom Coldwell worked closely to produce an on-line kiosk in the gallery space, as well as the production of a CDRom.

• http://www.paulcoldwell.org/
• http://www.vam.ac.uk/vastatic/digitalres...
• http://www.gallerysystems.com/news/archi...
• http://www.chart.ac.uk/chart2002/papers/...