London Design Festival - Intel Remastered at Old Truman Brewery

London Design Festival - Intel Remastered at Old Truman Brewery

23 September, 2011
by: Katuschka

Old masters, digital technology, and jelly: Kate Weir takes a trip into the future.

The Intel - Remastered show at the Old Truman Brewery features interpretations of famous, historical works of art; and an opportunity to show the possibilities of technology – such as MadMapper, AfterAffects and, of course, Intel Core Processors – in the context of fine art.

Due to increasingly affordable equipment and the success of technologically advanced art showcases such as the Kinetica Art Fair, digital art is beginning to offer increasingly exciting possibilities as the brush and palette enter the 21st century. Even David Hockney has got in on the act with his new iPad drawings. As pioneering digital artist Nam June Paik said “Technology has become the body's new membrane of existence” – shortly before enquiring after the whereabouts of Sarah Connor...

Turns out Paik might have spoken too soon. At the private view for Intel Remastered, the webcam-activated lights that form part of  Midnight Toastie’s flat screen re-working of Van Gogh’s The Starry Night predictably refuse to acknowledge us. “Usually it does it faster,” explains our increasingly nervous Intel guide, waving his hand in front of the screen.

“And this is Matisse’s Dance II,” he says herding us towards a mirrored installation showing an infinite regress of 'the blue screen of death’. To stop him from crying I suggest coming back later, and to the organisers’ credit, most of the pieces reboot and add some theatre to the private view experience, with Maxence Parache’s Dance II in particular providing much amusement for sozzled critics.

When you consider what the original artists achieved with relatively primitive technology, it is fascinating to see the digital updates of these great works. In the hands of Eric Schockmel, Turner’s The Great Western Railway becomes a dystopian and disorienting digital train moving through a bleak yellow landscape. Sara Hibbert’s interpretation of Degas’ Dancer With a Bouquet of Flowers is a delicate film montage, striving to emulate the dramatic stage lighting. And Lung’s multicoloured wall peppered with graffiti udders is unrecognisable as a re-working of Munch’s Scream. The only allusion to the painting is a looping video of Macaulay Culkin from Home Alone. Screaming at you ad infinitum, the repeated image gives some of the nightmarish quality of the original.

The exhibition is a testament to what could be done on a humble laptop; but there’s a sense of restraint and at times it feels that Bompas and Parr’s jelly castle (to accompany their The Last Supper photography series) offers the most exciting innovation. Perhaps I’ve been spoilt by the lush visuals of Pixar films; and perhaps Wii Art was a little too much to hope for, but as the surrealist writer Donald Barthelme stated, “Play is one of the greatest possibilities of art”. And Intel Remastered could have done with a bit more play – a smidge of Maurice Benayoun's immersive virtual reality projects perhaps, or the kind of sense-activated involvement seen in the V&A’s Decode exhibition back in 2010.

Combined with the possibilities offered by digital technology, this kind of playful approach would lift these old masters not just into the here and now but possibly even into a world of tomorrow.

Intel - Remastered is at the Old Truman Brewery until 25th September 2011.

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Katuschka