Concept & Creation

Elemental Echo was brought to me at the end of 2020, by Nina Samson, an extremely talented musician and close friend of mine. We were both preparing for our final year of study and were tasked with creating a major project that would eventually tie up our Creative Industries degree.

Initially, Nina had planned to have a single artist respond to a piece of music (that lucky artist being me) in order to create an immersive installation, a room where the art and the music are the only things on display. The aim was for the art to relate and be shaped by the music Nina created. However, the idea soon snowballed to include an online exhibition, website and an additional 5 responding artists.

We chose to continue with the call and response approach for the group exhibition as it showcased both Nina’s musical talent as a composer and the unique artistic talents of myself and the other participating artists.

The Theme

In order to create a sense of organisation and cohesion for our group exhibition, Nina and I chose to use a theme to unite the featured works. We were instantly drawn to the four elements (earth, eater, air and fire) as an overarching theme because of their importance in our everyday lives, the fact that they exist in everyone’s life makes it a relatable theme that all artists and audiences can connect with. Nina said, “I also love the versatility of our theme; the 4 elements can mean so many different things depending on each individual’s perspective. I believe this gave us a great opportunity with a group exhibition - the theme unites everything but also leaves room for individual expression”.

Curation

To hold this call and response exhibition, we planned on hiring a local art gallery/space to house the artworks for an exhibition launch before putting it all online for more people to see. The search for just the right space went on for months but when the recent lockdown hit, the move to online a purely online exhibition seemed to be the only option.

Without any experience in curating, promoting and hosting an online exhibition, both Nina and I were a little out of our depth with the project. However, we both did lots of research, tried and tested a few virtual gallery platforms and website layouts and liaised with our artists to create an almost seamless transition into an online exhibition space. We used ArtPlacer, an interactive virtual gallery space, to hold the exhibition and shared it with local audiences and those from afar via a branded website with artist profiles and ‘behind the screens’ extras.

Once the space was determined, we hung the artworks at real scale and framed them with the site’s virtual framing options. This then brought together a virtual exhibition that could be walked through and experienced from wherever our audiences were situated, giving them an almost realistic view of what the Elemental Echo exhibition would be like in person.