Stonehenge
Situated in the North Porch of Salisbury Cathedral, the main installation called ENLIGHTENMENT is made up of around 6,000 points of light which are suspended from below the porch ceiling. Visitors are able to move into this body of light and as they pass through they become active participants in what the Squidsoup creative lead, Anthony Rowe, calls a ‘Mixed Reality interplay between real and virtual’. See how the light responds to your presence, creating abstract forms in physical space.
A second installation, POWER OF WORDS, is in the Cathedral’s Morning Chapel. A growing tree of Magna Carta text projected on the medieval stone, it reacts to gesture or movement, causing the words to morph and re-form.
Jacquiline Creswell, Cathedral Arts Advisor and Curator said: “Art in Cathedrals is about communication and connection. The combination of the physical and intellectual demands of siting contemporary art in a cathedral is challenging. Squidsoups, light installations, ‘Enlightenment’ and ‘Power of Words’ are bold, they explore the modes and effects of interactivity, looking to make digital experiences where meaningful and creative interaction can occur.
“Squidsoup is an international group of artists, researches and designers working with digital and interactive media experiences. Their work combines sound, physical space and virtual worlds to produce immersive and emotive environments where participants can take active control of their experience.
“‘Enlightenment’; fills the North Porch with thousands of beacons of individually controllable lights, creating a virtual world, enveloping and stimulating the viewer. The installation contrasts yet compliments the gothic space, allowing the visitor to reflect on something new and mysterious, thought provoking and exciting. This artwork is concerned with the idea of the ripple effect of Magna Carta, how its principles have changed and grown over time to encompass much of the globe, we enter the space and feel the magnitude of the legacy of this important document.
“ ‘Power of Words’; projected onto North wall of the Morning Chapel, we see a wall projection of emotive words, with the theme of society and justice which, when touched, or otherwise interacted with, will move and flow and fall, creating new words. The idea behind this is to allow the visitor to reflect on the consequences of their actions and how their actions in the world may have an effect on it, perhaps not always what was intended…
“The projection also explores the power of the words, the Magna Carta document is not just a historical artefact, it’s a contemporary symbol of the power of words, of justice, freedom and accountability.”
The installations can be seen from June 13 to September 30
