Built in 1835 at the peak of the Industrial Age, the summer that Henry Fox Talbot exposed the world’s first photographic negatives, The Electrician’s Shop was designed as a 4500 square foot hive of experiment and manufacture. One hundred and seventy eight years later, curator Graham Carrick assembles the work of six innovative artists, including a new commission for Alex Allmont, an intricate Lego assemblage called Pot Noodle Drum.
Introduced by Isaac Newton in 1665, he defined a fluxion as the ‘derivative of a continuous function.’ Detailed in his mathematical treatise Method of Fluxions, establishing this natural philosopher’s early calculus, he coded a letter to bitter rival Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz as 6accdæ13eff7i319n4o4qrr4s8t12vz in their argument over who had invented calculus, the modern consensus being they developed their ideas independently. Here through art, mathematics meets applied science and automation, symbolism and semiotics, kinetic applications and photographic representations face off each other in a atmospheric industrial arena, with embedded aromas of oil and seawater, an intriguing statement before being converted into a wedding reception venue.
Project Title
FLUXION from the series Responses to Locations in Transition
Location
The Electricians Shop, Trinity Buoy Wharf, Poplar, London E14
Project Lead
Graham Carrick for Fitzrovia Noir
Production
Manuel Sanmartin for Mas Civiles
Film
ALXDZ alxdz.co.uk
Artists
Aaron Ford (UK)
Adolfo Kodema Perez (Mexico)
Alex Allmont (UK)
Alexandra Buhl (Denmark)
Guillermo Monroy (Mexico)
Harry Urgent (USA)
Jackson Fowst (UK)
Media
Assemblage, cake, electronics, flora, found objects, Lego, painting, photography, print
Date
July 2013
“Fowst conjures a windblown installation from items borrowed, to be returned after the event, low impact, sustainable assemblage; Allmont builds musical scores from intricate leftover Lego, delighting both ear and eye; Monroy nurtures chimeras from old sewing machines and collected ephemera of fallen fauna: Fluxion fascinates, drop by and have a cupcake, edible artwork free for those who venture out to where the River Lea meets The Thames. Recommended.”
Harry Urgent, Londonist