Semaphore
Semaphore, the art of conveying intelligence by sounds and signal across space, is of the highest antiquity with a history than can be traced from Ancient Greece through to the modern age. Through the creative recasting of source materials and new artworks, this exhibition explores semaphore as an ancient strand of human endeavour while exploring the particular phenomenon of semaphore on the island of Ireland during a brief moment in history. The works explore the subversion and control of time and space, the application of human invention in the suppression of nature, people and culture (through colonialism) and more broadly, ideas about landscape, the Anthropocene and the vernacular. The exhibition is interested in the lessons of how rapid developments in technology are assimilated into society and culture. The artworks celebrate the physical phenomenon and rudimentary construction of early communication systems and their situation within the Irish landscape. These legible and highly situated systems are in contrast to the cloud-based and non-tangible assets of the current digital communications economy.
Semaphore was commissioned for Architecture at the Edge Festival 2024 in Galway, Ireland.
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Stone Signals arranges a constellation of 36 signal towers along a simulated chalk coastline. Mirroring the proximity, relativity and physicality of the 81 coastal towers, the installation explores topography, coastal aspect, the impact of human activity on the planet’s landscape, climate and ecosystems (the Anthropocene). Within the marine environs of Galway docks, the piece explores Ireland’s distinct island condition on the periphery of Europe, and frontier of the Atlantic Ocean. The piece uses stacked Kilkenny black marble limestone bricks, in a geological exploration of deep time and the compression of history into a landscape formation.
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Field Stations present four ‘stations’ of iconography, exploring the monumental nature of signalling towers through digital drawing. The piece juxtaposes 18th century signalling apparatus against the rapid acceleration of communication and digital technology. In software programme, the semaphore term has been co-opted and is defined as a data structure.
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Line of Transmission recasts textual and pictorial source materials with new artworks to create an episodic exploration of semaphore and communication during the late 18th and early 19th century. The arrangement suggests a line of transmission through to the current digital economy and beyond, to the intangible trajectory of AI and quantum technology.
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