MEMORY MATRIX AND ANTIQUITY (FOR SYNCHRONISED MULTICHANNEL VIDEO)
5 x projectors from the in-house IMA gallery stock, aluminum, fans, and steel cable. Commissioned for Imaginary Accord, Institute of Modern Art, 2015.
Ross Manning has produced numerous works that subvert the potential and imbedded knowledge held within decommissioned or defunct technologies. Memory matrix and antiquity (for synchronised multichannel video) is a mechanical mobile installation that was commissioned for the Institute of Modern Art’s exhibition Imaginary Accord (2015) and repurposes five of the galleries decommissioned projectors. Mounted on balanced steel beams and propelled into movement by oscillating fans—the projectors point downwards overlaying and mixing the machine’s colour calibration screens. This test pattern is designed for synchronising multi-channel videos and emits the projectors purest versions of colours—containing the ingredients to mix, interpret, and project any image. With each tweak of settings and display of film, these projectors come to embody the knowledge of all the artworks they have shown—gaining authorship as each artwork is realised anew. Each sway of the beams slowly mixes and intersects the ready-made colour spectrums—generating their own layered imagery from these pure beams of light.