Review of art exhibtion at manchesters cornerhouse
POI: Moving, Mapping, Memory is running until the 29th of June and is certainly, as far as this reviewer is concerned, recommended for those who like a good dollop of speculative phenomenology in their cultural outings. Psychogeographists and those of a similar ilk should be making arrangements now. Point of Interest is, according to the press blurb, ‘a mapping reference used in networked and mobile media’. The eight artists involved have all created pieces that interrogate our perception of the environments we inhabit, exploring the ways in which we interweave with them, the viewer becoming the viewed, the noise of the onlooking crowd becoming itself a part of the work. Of course, utilising concepts of the spectres generated by the digital age juxtaposed against the human experience could be taken to be old hat already. A frightening concept within itself, considering how new the web 2.0 paradigm is. However, POI tackles the themes with some intensely thoughtful and original concepts, with the programme itself being in map form. The very act of having aspects of your existence questioned can of course, lead to the Marxian sensation of all that is solid melting into air, but that’s not always a bad thing. Space prevents us from giving each of the eight artists their full due, but here’s a brief taster of what you can expect.
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