Image – photograph 2012 by Pete Kingsford ‘Interactive Arts Degree show’
The opening night of Manchester Metropolitan’s Interactive Arts degree show was an exciting mixture of surprise and intrigue. Graduate students hooked their audience with a combination of live performances, mixed mediums, animations and films. Surprises around every corner made the experience a series of unexpected twists. Interactive Arts is a relatively new creative course but is already well known for its unusual and diverse exhibitions. Students are given the freedom to choose the mediums in which they become proficient in, allowing them to explore and network within the art community, producing individuals of a self-sufficient and colourful nature. One character which defiantly caught the attention of her audience, especially the younger members, was Rosa Vaughan, whose performance and puppetry during the event left many anxiously amused as she projected her own humour and personality upon that of Susie the puppet, as she greeted and amazed the crowd. Rosa was not the only member of the course to capture the interest of the masses. With riot provoking displays of the bronzed male physique, the female crowds where gratefully impressed by Arnold Pollock’s choice to create a live performance of his ongoing documentary, on the lifestyles and training habits of the extraordinary muscle layered bodybuilders as he trains alongside them.
Creative films where an abundant feature throughout the show, with individuals such as Kay Woodley standing out with an assortment of intimate interviews with those close to her. These short revelations and personal insights into her relationships and social connections left the viewer enthralled from start to finish, as she probed subjects which would otherwise be left unsaid between the family and social structures.
With an assortment of talents being displayed across the show it is difficult to pick one which I feel sums up the unique style and variety of talent displayed across the gallery. However, one piece in my opinion did stand out from the others. The graphic and interactive work of Wilson Logan, whose sensory installation allowed the audience to effect the visuals on screen though sound the made by spectators. This digital piece was unique to each that approached it, as the public reacted to it in a mixture of ways making the display outcome an array of colours and arrangements throughout the night.
By Rebecca Lange, Art graduate of Manchester Metropolitan University