George is a red phone box. People used George to talk to each other for over 40 years before they switched to using their mobile phones instead. First he was loved, then neglected and then finally abandoned.
George has woken up for the Brighton Digital Festival, and is keen to meet new people and play them some of the conversations he’s heard over the years, as well as share recordings of some of his more recent visitors and collect a new generation of thoughts and feelings.
This interactive artwork, created by The Fortunecats, is located in a red phone box on the corner of Pelham Square towards the bottom of Trafalgar Street.
By enabling the discussion of personal feelings in public, this modern relic aspires to invoke an egregore of potential community with no regard for its otiose condition, nor its place in the evolution of our communication strategies.
A report by the Near Future Foundation on the subject of Wellbeing highlighted five methods by which wellbeing could be improved: Learn, Connect, Be Active, Give and Take Notice. Each of these represents a reasonable solution to the various feelings of depression, inadequacy, alienation and loneliness that seem to be rife among us. Unfortunately it also seems that without a certain level of self-esteem it can be frustratingly difficult to adopt these practices as habits.
It seems, in fact, that the obvious stresses of the global capitalist human (from whichever social stratum) lead to habitual and addicted behaviours which prevent these actions of wellbeing. Our attempt to interrupt this had to exist somewhere that could literally and metaphorically stop someone in their tracks. Hence the phone box, a ubiquitous, yet redundant object of street furniture, an unusual but safe, private but public space.
We discovered through our previous work “Broken X” (BDF 2013) that members of the public were prepared to share details of their inner landscape with a synthetic human in a way they might be reluctant to with a biological one. As a result we realised that the mechanism used to ‘hold’ such disclosures from visitors needed to be built from our own practical experience. We decided therefore that it was necessary and desirable to explore the relationship between emotions as they occur and our habituated avoidance of them.
Strategies used to do this included Nonviolent Communication by Marshall Rosenberg, the works of Dr Richard Moss, C G Jung, Alan Watts and the practices of the ManKind Project.
And so we come to George. The prospect of engaging with spiritual or personal growth through contact with a machine has long been a theme of our work. George is perhaps an attempt to put a ‘village elder’ back into a modern community, a role which is absent in our contemporary societies. He is modelling inquisitiveness (Learn), vulnerability (Connect), self-care (Active), compassion (Give) and awareness (Take Notice) which may be the prerequisite qualities for those wishing to improve their sense of wellbeing.
Great thanks are due to Robert Hewitt, Duncan Henderson, Chris Hope, Jim Harris, Deborah Turnbull, David Mounfield, Heather Urquhart and the Cats Cabal.
George was in part supported by a grant from Brighton & Hove City Council.
Mammon is a giant mechanised replica of a Maneki Neko, the Japanese talisman of wealth and popularity, thought to bring good luck.
The Fortunecats have made many iterations of this work, the version at The Art of Bots is a comical, male, God of Capitalism created with poet Deborah Layzell. You can wake Mammon and hear his generativity composed wisdom and thoughts on the power (and vacuity) of wealth. You will also receive your own unique commandment.
Mammon was shown at Art of the Bots, at Somerset House, London – 15 &16 April 2016
Hosted by his Holiness the Reverend Michael James Parker, this is an opportunity to speak freely within the hallowed pillars of Fabrica – until the GONG tolls…
Six Digital Artists show works to a judging panel of seasoned art professionals.
YOU ask the questions YOU vote for the winner
£3 ENTRY buys YOU 3 votes
20:00, 10 September 2012 at Fabrica Gallery, Brighton
We are inviting artists working with digital technology to present an artwork and answer questions. It can be a completed piece, or work in progress and there will be a laptop, projector and PA at your disposal.
There is a panel of experts (including Jon Pratty from the Arts Council) who will comment on the work presented.
The audience then comment or ask questions.
The Gong is is rung to denote moments of significance. These can be salient questions, moments of clarity, confusion, boredom or poetry.
At the end the audience votes and the winner receives £50 and the Brighton Digital Art Prize.
The Digital Art GONG Show will take place at the Fabrica gallery on Monday 10th September 8-11pm.
We ran a Contemporary Art GONG Show in this year’s Brighton Festival and all the contributors found it useful for their practice.
If you are interested in contributing please fill in the form below (and please pass this on to anyone you think fits the bill.)
Fortunecat Productions have taken over the walls of The Rock Inn in Brighton for the month of May with an exhibition of paintings and new video works investigating what might be in the subconscious of the PM.
The May Festival is almost upon us and Brighton’s art community stands ready to peddle it’s wares. Yet it seems there are few opportunities for visual and conceptual art to be publicly discussed and judged.
This is a call out to any artist who feels courageous and unseen, be they established or emerging.
On the afternoon of Sunday May 27th at The Rock in Kemptown as part of the £5 Fringe, Fortunecat Productions are running an Art Gong Show in which a panel of seasoned art practitioners give their responses to work presented.
You are invited to bring an object, painting, idea, digital image or short performance that you feel represents your art practice.
The judges discuss the works and question the artist before the audience vote for their favorites.
The winner receives the £5 Fringe Art Prize
The artist in last place will be banned from showing any art for six months.
