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Audiovisual Cultures episode 60 – Illuminating the Self with Susan Aldworth and Andrew Carnie automated transcript

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hello and welcome to the official cultures podcast exploring arts and cultural production I'm Paul up there and for this episode I had the great pleasure of talking with artists Susan Aldworth and Andrea Carnegie kindly took the time while installing their work at the heightened gallery in new castle university to share insight and their joint exhibition eliminating the cells exhibited in both the Hutton and fan and commercial union hice in the center of Newcastle upon Tyne their work responds to the new castle university lad county projects which stands for controlling abnormal network dynamics using optogenetics a process of using lights to control cells which are genetically modified to be light sensitive implanted and having tissue specifically brain tissue and people living with certain types of epilepsy to help control seizures county is a collaboration between Newcastle University imperial college London University College London and the Newcastle upon Tyne hospitals NHS foundation trust their website can be fined at C. A. N. Teo dot AC dot U. K. if you'd like more information there is a wide range of materials and processes throughout the GLX ambitions and creating different approaches to a prince making video light and sculptural installations and embroidery the van exhibition is on until the twenty ninth of February and the heightened show finishes on the night of may twenty twenty so plenty of time to get along to the house and if you find yourself in the chain Boeser reading were saying do you enjoy these fascinating discussions with thank you so much for taking a bit of time might have here and still today at the Houghton if it's okay can we talk a bit about your exhibition eliminating the self and everything in full so that's a collaboration with Newcastle University and Andrew Carney as well hi to see animals and I've worked with the university %HESITATION two projects before one about schizophrenia in two thousand and twelve which was shown at the Hackney gallery could resembling the self and another one about sleep we showed at York St Mary's in New York in two thousand seventeen correct the ducks self and this one's called illuminating the self centered you might get done talking about I'm really interested in the relationship between our physical bodies and our brains and our sense of self enough sense of humanized anti I've been commissioned alongside under Connie in two thousand fifteen on another project looking at %HESITATION optogenetics which is a way of trying to get the lights into the brain to sort out various problems of the brain I'm not a scientist in my explanation of the signs you have to go into peace and son to school and doing that project I introduced Andrew to the scientists up here who were working on this project which is cool can do and what they're trying to do here is to find a way for certain focal epilepsies of switching off the epileptic seizure before it happens viasat two phones one is the range implanted a microchip %HESITATION one is by introducing some sort of gene therapy whereby the light sensitive cells reintroduced into the brain and the combination of the implant on these light sensitive cells the scientists to trying to switch off system sales of epilepsy it sounds quite sort of Frankenstein be honest I mean why would anyone want to have their brain interfaced with but the truth is with apple that she it affects one in a hundred people in the country and not hold back Alexis can be treated with drugs or with other sorts of brain surgery and so when I got the commission to make the work it's not illustrating the project it's responding to it it's looking at the ethics human implications and working with the scientists to widen the approach because epilepsy is nothing if somebody separate and that social justice %HESITATION with my way into it I want to find out what it feels like to live with the experience of living with epilepsy and why you might make the decision to have an implant so I've talked to scientists I've talked to clinicians about their patients during the project I've talked to a legal ethicist about the you know who's responsible for the brain and on the ethics of that but will find me up as an artist is talking to the people with epilepsy about their experience of it so that's the way I work as an artist so I decided I needed to find a lot of people with epilepsy to understand I'm one of the things I've found out very early on is that %HESITATION Minneapolis's when not treatable by trucks and then on to school but said jury and this possible cure and it's a very early stages of sun please would relieve some people because you can have hundreds to fix today and you know it's your own body's sort of letting you down it's changing the sense of self and what I've discovered is what is it seems to change your sense of certainty can you imagine waking up every morning not sure if you're going to get that day and if it is a public thing people see fitting so it's stigmatized it's complex I'm not sure because this idea of eliminating the stuff and this is an exhibitionist across two sites so we had the opening in the in the night before recording this even the expiration of the light and art to something that's been going on since day dot really so %HESITATION that marrying up with the science of feasting lights to change things in the brand is really fascinating to and there's a lot of light and the other part of the exhibition I think it's mostly with Andre stuff again my my son of types which are in the exhibition are made with light and sound the type is a photographic process which is you painted light sensitive solution on to paper and you place objects on to the paper and then developed by UV lights I use sunlight to mine so like just being really central to the development of the work and it's interesting having the opportunity to show across two sites so for me it's meant that a plane I could show you will based work which gives you audience a chance to contemplate the ideas in a different way alongside the installation of signage types that %HESITATION three very large portraits of people with epilepsy who came to sit for me and the portraits of a very personal reflection of the relationship between me and the sitter and that relationship with that that season that's what I want to do with those and then the work here relates to light because the light that the scientists used in the brain is blue so there's a lot of blue light and blue light and UV lights are on the same spectrum so if my installation here I contacted the epilepsy society and I found a hundred people who would be happy to write the stories of living with epilepsy and my idea was to get that imploded on to a hundred pieces of Victorian underway but a hundred embroideries and I pulled it off which is amazing underwear because Apalachee stigmatized and hidden conditions so it's like bringing it up to the open all civic touring underwear is very beautiful responds very well to you she liked and lastly I didn't want to have sort of a Victoria's secrets sort of sleazy piece of underwear and I didn't feel it would click the graphic testimony was that I would cheat and also I love Victoria I mean that's something that I find is that a very pleasing unemployed was said with UV sensitive thread and throughout the incident these hundred pieces of Victorian underway hang from the ceiling by police and in between each row awesome UV lights and the whole installation is going to move in the algorithm of an eclectic brain and then what happens with epilepsies normally in your brain that is firing a fair bit far off last week on a random program so that the clothes go up here and they go up that considering twenty rows of five down this huge gallery and then slowly the clothes will become synchronized which is what happens before people have a seizure everything your brain gets stuck a bit like soldiers walking over a bridge everything gets inspecting your brain and that's when the seizure happened so we're going to get the closing to get into this synchronicity and then it will stop I had wanted to close to fall to the floor but I thought that was a bit lecturing and so we'll just shut off the light switches that another way of stopping something it's a very ambitious please the curator working with Lucy Jenkins and the install is that they've never tasted anything so complicated put my head in my hands I should live but it's a good idea and it has to be C. enemy of making it work which is great yes it's better to have a go at something like that how to race absolutely and also I feel hugely responsible in carrying the hundred people stories and a hundred artists sewing because I mean I've had a hundred people from all over the country so informing creating thirty five people from the rolls would need to %HESITATION so I feel a huge artistic responsibility to those two hundred people who have given of themselves for this work about yeah it's really a collaborative fifty very attractive hello sign on top of that I've had this wonderful young guy could well that can suit has been my three D. designer who has built the frame and made to police it looks like Victorian theater to go with the clothes and he's dedicated months of his life to it and he's you know a young club the guy and then also on Bannon has done the algorithms for the computer and the motives you know because I can come up with these very conceptual ideas but I come to the hold of myself I suppose that it's important to have that visualization of just a snapshot of how many people the only thing I know there's a history enough ways of having studios with lots of people working for you and maybe it's to do with the feminization about that I'm happy to make my collaborative you know I don't need different think I've done everything I think it's important to name people who work really hard to put in a forty yes I know Texas well that's an incredible color today it's an incredible shift today that has been produced I was really staring at them last night because I just wanted to dive into the deep space today yeah the blue the summertime blues it was very interesting to do a lot of time experimenting on different paper services because you know it's a chemical process but it is very sensitive to pay to service and to how much some areas and I decided I didn't want to work in the U. V. books because what was lovely about working sunshine is that you get long shadows and it changes the images because if you can imagine the process is putting objects on the piece of paper in UV lights if the sun is casting long shadows in one direction you get a very you know if you look at mid day you go to for a different picture than you do if you work at four o'clock in the afternoon and having the freedom to play with the lights like that and July and August down in London where I was working we had a lot of sunshine I just couldn't finish before the bad weather K. at the time that and the blue in the end I ended up experimenting with heavy papers white papers and I found this Japanese paper quotas of washi which is only twenty eight grams it feels like %HESITATION rice paper %HESITATION just flipped off which is why can frame them and it produced both very sharp images and it always hit that beautiful blonde and I made my own chemicals up for these these sanitized solution because I wanted to be in control of everything at every level I like learning new techniques citing isn't half basket but more about that idea of portraiture because this three really large portraits in the end they're not just one panel so they're fragmented and yet clearly together in each case so those were originally in the national portrait gallery is that right a few years ago I suppose just getting at that idea of probing about mark the south and portraiture and tied to convey that a person is more than just a surface yeah you know there's all this other craziness going on and coming I do for them and it's fragmenting them and yet they're one person still I know those things are black and white so what was the process for making those yeah I mean you're quite right about the fragmentation of of a person I had to sit just came to me for three about three days we had long sessions talking and I was drawing and photographing them and they are innocent strictly portraits of them from those three days and maybe the fragmentation is a bit of me saying as an artist I'm not trying to capture the person okay I I recognize that we all you know that sort of philosophical thing we only exist in the moment we don't exist in the future and the past is just a memory so I was very keen on those portraits to be about the conversations I've had with them and so the moment tights with something %HESITATION shoot clay which means that I could print some photographic elements onto a used engine copy paper which I then put through the press with the other marks and the impacts so from the papers so it looks like she collects this means Chinese collage really and so it's a very interesting process for me when I'm trying to pull together the fragments of the person so I had that E. G. switches to sort of bring standing used to sort out that let's see the first picture Max he was writing a book on the magnet culture when I talk to him and he's a very very thoughtful spiritual person and I think the photograph that I took him I felt captured something very particular wonderful about him because he was working on the Magna Carta EEGs they they they mention to Latin script from the Magna Carta and the very heraldic I used my own brain scans to create a sort of her rounded shape around him because I wanted to as for the philosophical point it's my interpretation of him it's not him and so that was Max the next one along is feeling that she's going to have the ability just so they could absences which triggered by light can you describe to me how she you know so much I can hit to facing from maybe any two three seconds she just goes in and comes back and people don't necessarily notice but it is a form of epilepsy absolutely especially nailed his record to put him out of small seizure and she was very at that point in her life I'm willing to talk to people about her epilepsy and particularly she never wanted to note that her boyfriend snowed because she felt so I put her face hidden behind a home should be in her because I felt that she for the portrayed and he wants to show a very small part of himself and the Federal Trade whose Elizabeth she at that point in her life is definitely she's newly married and desperate to have children but she knew that the medication she was on her epilepsy she couldn't take when she was pregnant that would damage the fetus so I put her face in her womb infections going on to have to fight because children and she's having a great life but all of them describe to me at that moment in time their experience of living with epilepsy and the way in which it impacted on their lives that's where I feel is not to say to me what what can artists do by exploring epilepsy dot com cute people I come change the world but you might go to change you want them to change if you could bring things up at the end of the discussion you could make someone think about we hold something so it's a way of exploring the self and in this case it's a self that that she and that's why the portraits of fragmented because I think we all such complicated being I thank the lord the previous record dark stuff is very interested to read about that because that extra sleep more and it seems that there's a very clear relationship between what the brand does when it's very busy it when somebody's having a seizure and they may be on the conscious self and the brain when any of us states were not our conscious self and it's very busy and stuff going on in there a server every ship there for you as well it's all part of the this is a total exploration of the self that I do sleep I found particularly fascinating because everybody does it and I think the exhibition I did down in New York related to a lot of people I mean you know we always ask did you sleep well I mean I'm fascinated by the fact that I was surprised when I sleep I mean I got burgled when I was asleep and nothing happened except a listings but much of being a bad habit to sleep up trees and all mammals sleep and I think it's a very interesting part of being human I think it's a very important part of being an animal and I think it makes us think about what the brain is you know nobody quite knows why we sleep nobody knows exactly what goes on in this in sleep but what they do notice it without sleep we would die and without good sleep it impacts on mental health and well being so it was a fantastic subject and then very hard to explore visually because sleep is a dark nothingness and so I tried to find multiples in the end I fixed on the pillow case because it seems to me the intent that you leave in the pillow when you wake up is what sleep is this is a visualization of sleep so I printed off the lines of what trump black paper because I thought that then I could work against sleep and I made some sculptures which were the intensive had some pillows then I got people to embroider the dreams of the cases and hung them as well which is where my interest in community embroidery came from really and it seems that there's a relationship that as well between the fabric and suspects up being about one time occupied by ability again docu patients on their gap since of a body and maybe there's something there but what's going on with the brand the body's paradise so with this absence anyway and yeah this beautiful street and the %HESITATION the pillowcases that I use the excavation work X. hotel pillowcases so they would have had a history of the and then I feel the same with the underwear this another reason I want to use Victorian underwear because it's all the more it has a history before we come to it with these new stories I was so kindly but she donated to the underwear by a young woman who runs it been to shop in Hastings cooled that Jake McLean from hawk and dove and when we came to wash the clothes I've found that some of them had one person's name in them and they started officers of the very slim young woman and they ended up with a really cool the woman and the idea that I have on top of everything else that goes to the exhibition I have a personal history of someone's underwear off and removing it has a new life it has a new life yeah a new narrative but the old narrative is invented in a minute but the shape of the size of the player I'm putting the DNA %HESITATION is it okay to ask you about the transience change yeah I apologize I don't know very much but I was reading yesterday by the city of the brain tissue E. and I haven't seen any of the work so it's like it's okay I know that the chances were kids something that I'm incredibly proud of what happened was was what I was doing the national portrait gallery shows invited to go to Hammersmith hospitals Parkinson's brain bank two what should bring dissection and being an artist is open lots of doors for you and so when I first got that they got the brain out they were going to die said I don't know if you know the artist Helen Chadwick he was a wonderful conceptualized as to sergeant died too young and she did this fantastic so portrayed which was just a pair of hands holding a human brain and of course you can never help you and brain but it said everything I was trying to do so when I was in the lab I said could someone take a photograph of me holding the brain so cotton on to have a child with unless I was holding the brain I couldn't believe what it felt like it was cold it was locked and I suddenly it seemed to turn from object to subject in my hands because I was holding everything that person of being in this book not everything is subject to the physical body and I got very sort of moved by what you can do that to section off to that and it's a very formal procedure and they lay everything out very beautiful very very visually artistically laid out on the system through my head and I was in the middle of the portrait project the national portrait gallery so I was thinking wouldn't it be that you know the ultimate portrait would be to make a print from human brain and then I just thought he was gonna let me do that so I spoke to the professor afterwards and I said look I've just had this really strange idea can we talk about it and he was very open minded he said I think it would be exploitative to do that I think it might be a very interesting thing philosophically and also I think it could help people understand the relationship with the self to their brains and maybe more people would donate their brains to science featured help other people so he said I'll have to put it through the ethics committee at the hospital so we made the case rate and they said yes so you sometimes have to be careful what you wish for because having someone to do it I have to find out technically how it was conducted and the deal was that I could have some brain slices just for one day two days and there is a very short amount of time and that he would have to be with me at all times first of all I went down to Smithfield market in London and got some land springs she explains I could experiment with those and we got some interesting marks of them but the difference was that the human brain I don't see being informal behind and it was fixed if you like because of a brain is a very gelatinous so to speak to mon G. things in real life seventy six percent for that and then the professor and I drove down from London to Bexhill was working with most printing money Locksley and we knew we were going to do we were going to make catching something kept in place we were going to shake a hand shaking up the chain around the brain slice to make a very dark background but we had no idea what monk's we would get and we filled the full Monty Hyde would be fatty and in it she you need something fatty to resist the acid so we place a slice of the plate we should separate into round it to the brain slice off and we actually played some legal these remarkable images that looks like consciousness at work they're really beautiful and the some of the website was proud of when I found out later on that day not dated when she done the same thing with the human heart printed directly from it so I felt very selective with overseeing excellent company and the the actions of beautiful ocean room in London level session at the fitzwilliam museum in Cambridge to me the very significant works both in terms of the process of and the serendipity I had no idea we were going to get such beautiful marks from them and also to me the contact to the brain with the plate was huge statement of what the self with only got terribly emotional making the work not to ship a tear at some point because will you and we were working with commission with someone's brain with innocence again of a Frankenstein but it was done without the respect and thoughtfulness sadly I I was never allowed to move who it was because of patient confidentiality and that's quite right but I would love to somehow say thank you to the left side motion but if the thing anyway so that's the transient section it's not the whole plan for eliminating the south as well to try and communicate this is what people are going okay yeah I mean the story is all other people's stories because they tell the stories better than I could have it as an artist we're trying to use movement to suggest the patents in the brain that go on I want to create a slight the Regis is the wrong I went to a very it's a very big space the patent that I'm showing in its cavernous it's slightly cathedral like in a sense so I want to create a sense of awe and wonder hopefully between the sort of Victorian theatrical experience when the machinery moves and things so it's going to be performative the work will be on all the time it will come again I've also made a note to spokes of the people Ellen is being put on election in the gallery again keeping the sort of sensible to the people can read the full testimonies that people have written because they are employed it but because of the moving you might not have the time also in a few weeks time I'm making a PDF of the book so that if people want to read it they can I can send it to them because of the artist book to beautiful thing but it's an expensive thing and I want these testament is to have a life I said fingers crossed it'll work for third thing tomorrow night yeah okay to get back to making it making sure that we do that thank you for taking the time to talk to me thank you so much for your time the phone has been lovely to me thank you so much for interrupting your install for me so much time looking yeah and then %HESITATION seconds I hope and this is a health and safety issues I'm done with school and working on this one sense of the I need to replace because of %HESITATION gonna really for some reason %HESITATION but that's it so the videos out the since quite fitting in a way if something goes awry I have always done I mean in any exhibition is always kind of changes I mean that some of them happy changes suddenly yeah originally I went to the screen for the back okay it creates a space behind and suddenly another works I was thinking of showing fifty better and so something behind there in a couple more isolated in space and I really like that so in the mistakes in the errors in the accidents and things not working new things come about that's the really good thing about civil again with this case I was a bit worried about one of the lights the force me to get a second controller for it and it works better than it did before taking up different kinds of signals those who left kind of things happen in exhibitions new stuff arising is it okay if we describe what we're saying yeah yeah yeah so %HESITATION in front of us at the moment we've got this long screen so you've got these layers of matches said his voice yes this is my normal net curtain that trickle curtain Houston projecting threats as a kind of twelve minutes a long project so using four channels of video play %HESITATION about twenty nine minutes plays very slowly because these transformations and the boy will just give you this kind of feeling of death when spoken of strangeness puts you in a limbo kind of specs which I really like going to school at the minute this call may be monitored for the mother so it's mainly black and white yeah absolutely because at certain points okay that's one of the works who works on census except for this work this work stays on continuously right the blues blues affecting billions with drawings on that trigger to every so often will come on and on that similar one cities and at the end yeah of course I'll go invading in the other parts of the show up go simple blues in office because the slightly different he said whether they will miss our logical building yes these ones are about twice or three four times as big as the ones that I just don't have to work on the bigger ones the huge ones it was a sixteen or twenty feet in diameter but that's another story yeah the rules hand drawn on six even with some friends doing it my wife kindly doing quite a lot it's taken a lot of time and with the big ones you find all doing really well it all happened in any of this with the tool it's a letter to the flames so that's the point of interesting process entities not ready Brandless is it but it says it's kind of it's kind of and your own mapping and and images of neurons and there's this thing that when they inflate they should consult a different images then when the flat one point like is the quiet moments like tennis when they're blowing up in them and the fans go off the stop deflecting the some kind of silence which already like are they that by E. V. like Sir this is gorgeous to %HESITATION LEDs and okay the the state just got issues that are very similar yeah absolutely this looks like yeah black lights the lights on working with them that's fine this one piece the scope please answer that said that it's on the corner of the time's going to they'll settle down and then they would come on all of the senses have come hibernate cycle so they want instantly come back on you have to wait for a full five minutes want to people's concentration to changes in the exhibition focusing on one piece of the big video and then like this the treaties of the a festival now and so that's how slow the remote one small step of work to do on the TV moving around signet stock it results in a call to work out why can't stop so this one is again it's just an online memory fills up with the shadows much lower and you've got a really beautiful symmetry with the shape of the twigs coming out of the tree and cities Nero yes yeah this kind of relationship between content to take full inside the house and the denture to perform it in trees and these are not just the trees of the circle the roots on as well so that kind of problems with the life cycle services in that kind of world events I also go over and then okay yeah the new runs on the balloons and then there's a kind of neural part of the system yet this is a real seven news basically I have got used to the titles of once you this one's called a binder the card okay you can see these Texas is a little your boss was another you'll refer to the optogenetics the work was being done by talented but in this one the secrets of the options with the will of the detecting cost out the blue lights so that that room this one is coming along it's more like a kind of crisis in the body right very small contributions from geico messed up systems in the yeah so there's lots of things that were coming about lots of it's being billed as a kind of taking over the research and the work of repair the time and then things speeding up if you look at that on this trip exactly what creates a suddenly this bright charismatic piece that happens that means kind of driven us away it's going to be the one what's the way the if you're in the main kind of part of the government so it's because this is a better product Hey yes the food was on hand for you should we treat piece from the hexagonal qofka window and then if something comes up in this one other piece that's kind of not playing pool at the minute which is a place of peace transaction declined by the CIA well I've just got a new controller so hopefully something they're going to plug it in and it's all going to work it's just the power unit for some reason it's not picking up the signal from the water is controlled by the end of today it should be working so this is basically a very large media on this for all the fixes yeah and this kind of case pieces while watching the street was like sign truck that you might have heard is in here %HESITATION that comes out every so often and that's on the sensor but also when that place that's the fun that comes on the news the oil and it's kind of very interesting aspects of the laces when they're open because that needs to be a kind of a line at certain points during the exhibition problem with it at the minute is that is the latest in common frequently enough until long enough kind of an issue and so if you look around at different points of triggers should set off we'll be in this mess but this one stands on the top it is triggered by the side of the car percent it also plays more vigorously when the silent the weather in San comes from down that this call is heavy on banks and then they kind of backed down the ladder on the way are the colors %HESITATION significance they ought to be in a sense I mean the blue always leads to the October is gonna five blue lights to signal to the cells to flatten the epileptic attack to the blues significant amounts of Blue Ribbon Primerica and then in this one it was just this kind of sense of using points as a kind of normal situation standard situation situation and the red as a kind of crisis and it's kind of typical color code Michigan city not since it was just one yes and it went from red to green wait a minute I'm going to cover that sense of the value of it it shows it's all within the same so that someone come and see you at the other end come on this one is this hopefully so some of the experiences in life and in the city center for the night the whole upper part of what's up all space with them on some of the ones in my vision of it meant to be more central kind of blocks out the video so we had to move it back did you see it's not something very long should be on for a lot longer that's what I hope to just sort out this afternoon I'm sure LaFace maze by tomorrow night well it's but it'll be worth it if there's enough officials are not happening without necessarily working completely yeah it's a bit like a few of the small programmable fans working properly but this fifty four all together for the moment working that's a lot to look at and beyond the limits of my technical ability being away from home to school now I need to work out the switching mechanism but that would be great would you like to listen on how you got involved with candy in terms of how I got involved account too I mean it's been a long process and it involves an individual %HESITATION nine concentric Stevenson who I suppose it's a little bit of a patron of the office of men across the page and in a sense to me I mean he's helped with a couple of projects I've been doing paying for me making work his ex's assist who runs a kind of a venture capital for startup companies ninety was involved in material testing so the big companies make money which is down in part reinvests in science but also helps artists to make work he done one projects approached him about doing another project with him with Susan and he said well I'm really interested in optogenetics and we went to a few talks and things and Susan spoke up and said well I think the team in new castle who I know very well I think that they use oxygen at six as a process in trying to do something and so we start with that and that was about five six years ago now and we came up and Susan and I made a series of joint prints that are on show by it's a kind of introduction and that was the beginning of it so we did that and then we so well we can also do that maybe we should apply for big public engagement money the sciences were very keen on it because I wanted to talk to the epilepsy community about that work and this is to be an opportunity to welcome was very keen on it so that you can use a very reasonable grounds to make work for over three years yeah so we've done about two years research for me about a year of making this work most time making the video and then the sculptures of components of it since then what's been good I think I've made ten works together maybe slightly more eleven works and they're all substantial I used to making things quite quickly go back to processes of making video and I was getting a little bit of help him on that when I used to do all the door and I handed the videos and live for the trees and everything and now I've got some people that will help me with that that makes it a lot easier in the last piece I made a large video projection like this was about the rights in meetings or X. two three days a week the door explorer so I was amazed by some editing and I was exhausted this one bicycle which works on three months and then we started to and it's a projection together it's a blend of drawings and photographs of myself in a kennel listings come into it I've kind of seen and experienced one of the things I'm kind of interested in those you know this notion of the trees where I live around Winchester called lots of them have missiles and the missiles I seem to me to be like a hundred points of epilepsy in the brain with this model of self selected quotes photographs of the supplier and they became incorporated and I quite like this idea of improving the missile type but in an impossible act maybe and that's where the up today text comes in really this operation on the implementation of the alternate into the brain will come when they call surgically remove that sentiment do something it's a kind of points of law school it's the last thing they can do that's what I hope so I think that's kind of interesting so deals with different issues of putting things into being watched as well with the sense of the op try being in that room the logarithm that's produced by people that are outside the body to you being controlled by the way I know we roll control in a way by other people but this very particular thing about one's body which has ownership and so the fat and the U. S. B. five piece of vein is very much about right it's got lots of quotes about being a cycle brings this kind of multiple person with a device inside it's being controlled and I often want to connect the real source of considerations legalities about all sorts of questions now arise about where we move in %HESITATION lines interesting question think of the big companies want us to own the impossibly helping us and not in a sense hold responsibility if they go wrong and that's a really interesting six of eight the not very clear about who it is that you think you owe them but I actually feel it's quite good that they own them that responsible thing go wrong and they have to put them right some interesting topics yes brings up a lot of ethical issues so I think the pieces vein or the one piece of the ads a tale of two is the piece that kind of not just those questions is not a simple story yes pros and cons of all of these things need to be well I mean the other big project I've been involved in for ten years it's been about heart transplants and that's really interesting because the psychological issues of having somebody else's hall all remains a very complicated for people people have contraceptives holding that in mind and the troubles of the times we have to talk about that and that's partly because with heart transplant when the patients come back to the hospital the very thankful for being alive they're very ready to scrub the complexities of the issues that they have for that and the team in the hot project sets out to interview the patient's personal spot in their own home and then you get a different story about a much more complex relationship in that case because it's a hot that's come from somebody else complex relationship with the donor and the donor's family I mean this is more complicated as well because %HESITATION option Essex County project will be putting in a locked into the price but it also has to affect genetically the cells near where the object is to make it work so they have to be basically primed to be affected by the blue light that the option will give out when it senses an epileptic attack coming and happening to suppress the cells that has to be introduced and so this genetic modification of human beings and that's put in by viral plexus people might be upset about that the virus has to be put into the body to deliver those options which of controlling settles into the right place so yeah very complex very interesting I think about who we are how we see ourselves through science you know and I think it affects all the think it helps is kind of on the stand %HESITATION cells by seeing what happens in the science and maybe a particular group or class of people because of patients can tell us less about who we are so I kind of understand the motives of and the different pathways and autistic Braden tells us what about what normally is cool what school the gradients to be known Johnson this is very interesting to discuss an introduction to pieces it's gonna actually working so if you see the blue lights and yeah the flash will come along with the sound levels go up please it's working because yesterday it was a complete asshole as you see that with the two lights sensors Watson and so it says Wilson from close to the lights around campus and see this one just a little bit from the other side yes so yes it's a nice invitation because you would not a medically thank that you can come around here could it feels about what because the signal is a tricky thing or something else yes this idea of something being a nurse just tidying up we've got to clear one on one assistance but yes seventies just small ponds fitted with LEDs that already the %HESITATION preponderance in that you could just buy a really but some of them I've also because yeah some of the program you can put words on them %HESITATION yes the case case blue jeans go this is a state I thought she should be more visible and that's one of the tweet controls are going to do is just west of the city okay just been fixing the subject of a number of this one which is not playing well the census compiled parts one and so is the idea that the oil will draw lines in this Sunday's are swimming media sensing the finance it's been slightly problematic in terms of health and safety of the lasers because lasers in my studio came down a lot lower now they have to be hopper because we don't want anybody looking into that directly there's all these things thanks in advance do you have an overall Air America for the exhibition is that of a communicating to the general population about it this is what it might be like for people with epilepsy or anything like that gentleman that perhaps it's small like you know the phone wants anything to be discussed it's about what the sciences it's about being kosher in the sense about what it gives us but it is telling us very much at the moment about who we are and how we are in the world and I think that we need a kind of critical forum for discussing that and I think this is a point to begin to think about that to have the discussion and I don't think that the exhibition is the totality of the asylum I think this consent provisions the workshops to schools things have been going on all of the other kinds of things are as important in fact in the hall project what remains of it that is these comes three day symposium where we get professionals and I would begin to unpack some of the issues and some of the issues then or even the weather so we've had specialist auctions prognosis saying oh I've got to change my approach I I haven't thought about this tool so we kind of seating ideas about things and and it's an option for me I'm an artist I'm not an illustrator what I'm saying that parents of love illustration and it's very good I'm not saying that illustration is pool robot you know it's part of it but it's more than that that's about to compensation and I think that's what artists do they have a call they could use a platform where things can be discussed in a wider more complex way and also just to signal things I mean I think that part of my job is to signal to the people of the young artists this is what you can do these are the possibilities you can use a commercial fan and you can make a piece of work about that thank you it's permissible to do that you know I started with this page and I still think on the payments by musing lights and there are other ways of achieving things and did not said this old well sort of levels I think which are work complex aspirin okay no good thank you so much for your time the phone you've been listening to audio visual cultures with very special guests seasonal Doris and Andrea Carney many thanks to the hot gallery for accommodating us as well this episode was hosted recorded edited and produced by polo player the music is coming grinds by our tone licensed under creative Commons noncommercial three point zero license and can be downloaded for MCC mixer dot org many thanks to membership Petri on dot com forward slash AP cultures for your much appreciated support one of two nations to help keep this going are gratefully received as well at PayPal dot me forward slash PP a prior episodes are released every other Wednesday subscribe in your podcast app so you never miss an episode our fill back catalogue can also be finding you cheap if you date her on Instagram as safety cultures parts person please AP cultures on Facebook and Twitter if you'd like more information and useful links thanks so much for nesting and catching next time
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Audiovisual Cultures 104 – Beyond the Halls with Mackenzie Finklea automated transcript

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This is Audiovisual Cultures, the podcast that explores different areas of the arts and media join me your host Paula Blair and the researchers, practitioners and enthusiasts I meet along the way see our website at audiovisualcultures.wordpress.com and other links in the show notes for more information for now enjoy the show thank you for cheating and see what do you think she'll cultures the podcast that explores different areas of arts and culture with me your host all up there to date we're returning to a topic of great interest to me but it's one that we haven't visited for a while namely museums  with my special guest today mackenzie  Finkley. mackenzie is the author of beyond the holes an insider's guide to loving museums and mackenzie has a background and that's our policy as well so these are all great topics for us to really get stuck and say after I expanded very warm welcome to you I can say hello %HESITATION hello it's so nice to meet you and talk to you today yes like grace McKenzie hi are you eating are you well today I am doing well today thank you for asking if you hear any %HESITATION low but is that is the fun musical sounds of the cicadas in the trees outside my house it is very hot where I am and I'm very thankful to be inside in the air conditioning okay interesting is it okay to ask where bites your at the moment absolutely I am from Houston Texas in the United States that's pretty exciting Texas is a state I'm very curious about it I'm very curious but holistically emeritus for Sierra taxes since an interesting place I gather but yes very hard at the moment yes it is an interesting place that is an enormous state with all different kinds of cultures and biomes where can I talked quite a bit but museums I hope we're going to properly Nur die to play museums it's a topic I really love we have had some episodes about eighty CM visits and certain museums and that kind of thing but not for read a long time so I'm so grateful that you've brought up this opportunity to talk about next set topic really close to my heart as well I've lived all kinds of museums since childhood and I was wondering what is the debate museums that really draws you in so much that's such a good question what is it about museums that draws me in so much I think for me I am an incredibly visual person and I also love to learn and the museums are beautiful marriage of those two things I love going to museums and getting to see objects of history kind of having the starstruck moments where you're like hello this is a piece of the moon you can actually touch you know things like that and getting to learn then to continue on the moon example there's this really great exhibit where they had all these different scales and you could learn about the difference between mass and gravity with the scales and it would tell you how much she would weigh on different planets who right on the moon versus all the other things instead of getting to see those actual numbers and laugh about them with your friends right like the thousands of pounds you weigh on Jupiter right it's fun interactives and moments like that and shared experiences that are why I love museums so much traffic on Sir do you have a favorite type of museum do you love all the same sekali R. as a techie types of sneezing cyclic like some specialized museums I have a special place in my heart for natural history museums those are probably my favorite type I do love all types I love visiting all types %HESITATION more recently I found a new found love for art museums and contemporary art so my favorites and my current loves are always changing but there is a special place in my heart for natural history is not to to U. S. life on this planet and learning more about that more but she made history what is it exactly by natural history that really get to see much it's exactly that it's all of the above what gets me is trying to answer these really big picture questions of who are we where do we come from how does the world work in all its facets you know how to animals live breathe eat reproduce what's the water cycle what's volcanoes and natural disasters and all of these really big wow factor things that are very much real parts of our life that we for centuries are seeking to understand and always always there is something new to learn and there's always a new fossel it's been discovered that teaches us something different about evolution of some species whether or not it's us or %HESITATION turtles or dolphins or you know the list goes on and on that's why I love them there's always something new to learn and it answers really big picture questions and concepts yeah I'm a big fan of sat T. I. E. when I was a kid I probably still stay from feminist I I have a burning desire to be a paleontologist's dinosaurs are must love of I think yes to anything pre historic is mind blowing to me and hi that sets and tell us today is ridiculous to learn of plates have you had the opportunity to visit lots of difference natural history museums and lots of different locations I wondered what you think of the sock comparative experience yes I have had the luxury of visiting other natural history museums in other locations and I will tell you that one of my ultimate favorites and it's gonna be a funny answer because it's not like the biggest or the most impressive but one of my favorites is the natural history museum on the university of Oxford campus okay what I really love about that museum is just the architecture the %HESITATION this is gonna be such a Gen Z. thing to say but the vibes but also there are these really cool parts of the museum where there are all of these columns made out of all the different types of stone that are native to the British Isles and that is such like an incredible learning moment because not only are you showing like you know the strength of stone how it can be used but in context with actually where the museum is and that makes that particular museum unique because so many natural history museums cover all the exact same topics or they try to have the exact same replicas of famous bottles but not all of them have the fossils right because only one museum can have it in the one copy but I thought that one was particularly compelling that in a very just generally enjoyable experience for me %HESITATION that's ridiculous here I haven't even been to Oxford so he's got me on that one that you sang that does remind me there is a really nice natural history museum in Manchester university so just a bit north of socks and it's talks right end of the campus so easy you really have to know what's in there and I love the small ones like that we can collect the chore syndicate all the samples and it'll different rock samples and stuff it's a really nice example tonight where anybody does something unique because as you say there's a pretty big ones you know opens today natural history museum of London that's when you have to go see if you're there and absolutely yeah it's huge and it's almost overwhelming there's so much stuff I am also an example of Zeus smaller rooms as well I think that's really important to remember are these the kinds of things you go into the and your back beyond the wholesome mean what was it that really motivated GT go right I love museums not enough other people love museums I need this project this problem what was it about all the stuff that goes to the right topic it was exactly all of what you're describing so when I was doing my studies in anthropology towards the end of my undergraduate degree I realized that my interests primarily lie in displays of human culture and I was getting %HESITATION professional museum studies certificate and I was visiting at least one U. CM a week many times more than one and I was doing all of this writing and learning all these things and having these great experiences and I wanted to share that with other people I wanted other people to enjoy museums and learn these valuable things that I was learning at my studies in a very specific kind of program but I wanted it to be accessible %HESITATION and help people you know love museums more sense it's important and we can of course get into that later if you like but ultimately what I wanted to write was something that was it accessible as I believe museums should be accessible to everyone so why would I want this book to be any different right I wanted something that wasn't a boring tech X. book like truthfully many of the books I had to read for class and I wanted something that wasn't just a very specific guide to a specific kind of museum or place or period I wanted it to be a general exploration of museums especially for people who don't visit or think they're not important or just want to understand them better so that's ultimately what I produced was a guide to loving museums that covers a ton of different areas green I wonder is well it might what do people see as barriers T. access as you say because I know my experience in the U. K. it's may be seen as a for a middle class things today is going to museums even if most of them are free to go and say it's just something that other people daily where is my background is probably a bit unique in that I am my grandfather was a security guard and %HESITATION living history museum so I spent a lot of my summers just running a fight these fields and this living history museum so it was a fluke and transports me Sam so I was physically learning about the history of my please so it was the Ulster folk and transport museum in Northern Ireland they would have said actual colleges that people really live stand would have been taken apart very carefully rebuilt some sites and sometimes they would have investigators are demonstrators the last time I was there and this was just a few years ago they had somebody using the latency no somebody actually waving the way they would have a couple of hundred years ago you know and telling us if I didn't mean it is just such a fascinating experience like you're saying that's when you can actually see it and it comes alive free it's much more meaningful so it's something I think about quite a bit is how do we get more people to realize this is for years while you know it's fake questions %HESITATION just to try and drill into that a bit more we want to purchase G. Shanker are helpful and trying to achieve not that's a good one I think it's a lot of what you just said %HESITATION making museums accessible and in many ways entertaining and the entertainment value can either be in your face or more nuanced and here's kind of what I mean by that is within your face entertainment you're gonna have really interactive museums opportunities to ride on train cars you know through nineteen twenty Chicago right or actually touching a moon rock to use an earlier example but then the other more nuanced ways in which %HESITATION museums can provide entertainment value is through fun games or educational curriculum that museum educators provide and museum educator is like a specific position at a museum but I'm sure you're familiar with and those are typically the people that lead school tours or field trips and they will come up with a whole set of really interesting games for ways to interact with things as simple as a painting on a wall to really provide context learning opportunity and that's something that's actually fun and memorable so that's another thing that I really wanted people to have access to was games that they could play on their own in art museums and help them realize it's not as boring as you might think it is at face value yeah is this just to push a bit further without points on interactivity I'm a big fan of tears I really like a museum terror and to see absolutely yes three the ISIS somebody you because it's usually a volunteer it's not even always a member of staff at somebody who has such passion or maybe they're retired historian or something and they have such a passion that they want to lead people three and for you to see it through their eyes I think the last time I managed to date that was an Attenborough I think it's the national museum of Scotland it was thought it was a retired historian and he was just so lovely and so knowledgeable oil and just really passionate you get a nice good people and you're walking around together and %HESITATION I mean this was in December of twenty nineteen so this was before things were really naming properly it was a real joy because I think it's a Saturday or you can get really overwhelmed if it's a very fake museum with lots of different sections and it's trying to cover all the bases and to just see it three right we're just gonna get the specific things in there you're going to see a narrative unfolds got something it's really getting to me what do you think it bites hers and that sort of thing because you can also get order you terse order ops and things like that they'll take you on a tour of mean do you have much experience aside or what are your thoughts on those sorts of activities absolutely in my personal opinion is that I love in person to worse more than anything because audio tours are great they are accessible you can use them at any time you can access them from home in some cases personally I'm less inclined to listen to an area ambiguous robot voice as I'm walking through a museum way more inclined to exactly what you were saying watch a person get really animated and passionate about the things that they're talking about hearing from their expected natural off the cuff storytelling and not as scripted recordings I do really enjoy museum tours especially in the before times you know when I would travel to go see a museum I would make an effort to try to book a museum tour because that's also if you have a limited amount of time in a city or a place they will show you the highlights they will show you the most compelling pieces or artifacts that the museum highlights and then tell you from their perspective it gives you really great insight into the culture of that place as well getting to experience it through the eyes of the person who lived it was online math it's it's not something you a field of in the past couple of years because we've had last access I don't know what your pandemic experience in Spain but I have to museums near ye been accessible through online means I mean there's all sorts of implications are with from dying and he's able to provide that of course then again we've been able to access places in the world we may not have been able to before because we can travel there so I was wondering hi his your access to museums bane and the past couple of years hasn't changed a lot I will say so my book was published in December of twenty nineteen so slightly in the before times right I do talk a great deal about the digitization of museums and how a lot of museums even before Kobe we're starting to put a lot of their collections online to be more accessible to people which is an absolutely great thing and speaks volumes about the rapid acceleration and development of the internet and digital access in general then during a global pandemic that rapid acceleration towards digitisation such a hardware display is more important now than ever because many museums especially in the beginning when everything especially museums had to shut down entirely a lot of museums didn't bounce back from that number had to permanently close some are on the brink of having to permanently close and so being able to provide visitors with ways to engage and support the museum from the comfort of their home has played an increasingly important role not only in accessibility for learning opportunities but also in supporting the museum's business model and keeping it open and continuing to be able to preserve cultural history so locally to answer your question yes the museum's near me have done a really great job of providing virtual events especially in the in the thick of it as we were starting to get better %HESITATION but a couple months ago they were doing a really great job of providing outdoor events things where people could come together distanced but still have these great learning opportunities or a lot of museums near me and across the country have implemented the concept of time demands so that way you come at a certain time and there's not too many people in the museum it runs to the course to prevent the spread of disease a lot of that has changed in the past couple weeks even but yeah hopefully that answers your question it's a lot to think about it I think and as you say the implications of that acceleration of moving everything online we're in very intense times it feels there were times especially for early on when we didn't really know what this was he asks you know a year and a half ago I felt a bit overwhelmed just thinking oh this is going online %HESITATION that's going online %HESITATION I can view got exhibition online I'm sitting but I need to get some work son I can't just sit and let me see here yeah the three sixty degrees online all day and ended up forgetting about it most of it so I think in a way personally I fax est museums and galleries probably a lot less than I would have done if I had of been able to just go right I'm just gonna transfer it to him to school and have a look round an exhibition or something and I don't know hi David title but I wonder if other people are taught that similar experience where people have access to more because before they didn't have the time and then they're on furlough and the dates and all sorts of things I think people who study this sort of thing in a formal way are going to have some work cut out for them to go through hell with him would you like to receive updates links and special offers straight to your inbox and visit audio visual cultures tower presto com to sign up to our mailing list something I eat thank you bye a lot as well as potential problems as PCM speeches we were talking earlier but some of the bigger older ones and especially here in the U. K. risks auctions last colonial history and places like the British Museum matches in upstate global and situation and many ways because there's nothing actually British and they have very little and he everything's covered from everywhere else and I was wondering if you ever come across people challenging yet but that sort of thing because I feel like it's something we need to address that we need to confront said we need to just say yep that's our history and that's not but why do you feel the bite those sorts of issues if they arise and how you might deal with challenges to pot I do really enjoy this topic I like talking about the British Museum because truthfully I have a love hate relationship with that because the very first time I got to visit the British Museum was in the summer of twenty eighteen so I had not yet finished my degree I was the summer before my senior year %HESITATION budding anthropologist just like jumping in my seat waiting in line to get into the British Museum because it is you're absolutely right this global institution where you can see thousands of years of human culture across the world in one place started walking through and seeing all of the things and wondering where they came from and how they came to be into that institution and learning more about the ways in which those objects were acquired and then some of the contentions regarding the fact that a lot of those objects have been requested to be formally returned and subsequently denied so the more I learned the more that the magic was kind of stripped away from me so it's been really wonderful institution I absolutely believe that something like that should exist but at the same time yeah you have really big ethical questions that need to be answered and yes people do challenge me on this topic they will often say well especially in the case of the British Museum if they started giving things back they have to give everything back and then they have nothing left which is such an exaggeration and far from the truth but I think that certainly concessions you need to be made I think it's an important topic to philistine and I think we just need to be honest I've heard our colonial power in this country I think the sooner we are in the center we don't yet our ancestors to thought and it's not pretty intense violence on that's horrible scenery might maybe move on as a society yeah we need to find that balance is holding things in posterity and learning from not passed but also not just forgetting and sang all everything's fine and whitewashing it you know quite naturally it's good to know I used to say look I thought sort of thing I think it is an experience when I first I think it was two thousand and nine when I first went to the British Museum and I had thought I was going around going oh everything's from everywhere else and how did they get yeah I had a very similar awakening to it and then just gradually find out more and more but that's not to say that people shouldn't go because it's a really yeah one situation like so many of them that's another pretty basic example and I do have a great love of small museums curiosity type museums ready specific things whether it's seen them myself for where I've seen them on the TV program and they're all ministers places to visit remember being in Barcelona one time and there is a chocolate museum and I was just solely sculptures made out of chocolate I never intended to find somewhere I wasn't looking for that I didn't know I needed thought my life but I went and I had a choice tied as under if you had examples of things again that were smaller and worker came because we talked the natural history examples earlier but at any other came to three specific things that you really love him much like to highlight there are hundreds of small and quirky museums and the first one that comes to mind it's so embarrassing but it's hilarious there is a toilet seat museum oh really in Texas is kind of off the beaten path and it's not about the history of toilet seats or anything more than anything it's a public art display so he has this essentially a garage at this random man's property %HESITATION where he has floor to ceiling toilet seats that people have decorated signs and just completely imprinted their personality on too and I think that there is just so much to think about in terms of what that says about American culture individualism consumerism like you really could get into the weeds with that but also at the surface it's this really fun and quirky like toilet seats you know I think that's a fun example in haven't friend he's an artist and her her work is ready the weird things that she collects and she's done residency site in Virginia you're ready small tines in Virginia and she's done artworks based on right this time has this particular Moscow and sushi's meet at an art exhibition slash museum items things to do with this hot dog mascot you know it's really super specific really off the beaten track I really love things like that really quite blur the fine J. between what's an art exhibition the museum collection yeah you know something that really muddy suse waters I'm quite and spots I'm quite interested and intrigued by things that aren't necessarily museums but the jury yen and then you think actually this is quite like a museum you probably have places like this in the United States as well I don't know if you're aware of the National Trust for example or English heritage you put me on their buildings to places that they look after they become museum of fights I suppose that since and I was wondering what you thought of as well is that a tear of the CMS occasion another awkward first yeah that process of museum of finding an old place or anything like that is that something you've encountered very much sure what do you think that I would send the National Trust in the United Kingdom is definitely more prevalent than the national trust's awareness in the United States so similar concept the National Trust here seeks to preserve places of architectural significance but the National Trust in England is of a different breed I say England because that's the specific region I've been exposed to the most the National Trust and the United Kingdom is a different rate because it's become something more of almost like a passport you have all of these places where you see the little logo and you can almost fill them out and take them off and go and visit them it's also significantly smaller country to explore but %HESITATION yeah I'm getting to go to see places in Dover %HESITATION you'd see the little logo going to the Stonehenge I believe is also included in the National Trust the national trust's in England definitely and the United Kingdom was certainly more obvious to me that and the existence of a national trust in the United States and museum of occasion there are a lot of places and I include them in the book is that don't necessarily feel like museums but in many ways aren't because museums are preservation's of human culture and if we look at it that way lots of things can be used yeah libraries kind of falls under that category historical holds certainly fall under that category and so the museum of the cation of something if we want to think about that word is probably including a gift shop including educational materials to explain the context of the architecture of a place or its contents ticketing and branding and all these things so it's almost like could be institutionalizing of something that makes it a formal museum and there are always those questions over things what gets to be preserved what is deemed worthy enough to be captain posterity he makes those decisions he gets the side when he gets what money to make those decisions so it unfolds and unfolds all the time that's quite a complex issue I think is quite recently at the National Trust property call Tom Brady hall in Worcestershire and it was only saved because it has the specific wall paintings they're actually part of the walls these murals are painted and sites by a specific artist they need to pick specific sayings it's these Greek myths same spot the faces of men swapped out for political figures of the time as just a splash of this is how wealthy we are this is where our political leanings site you're welcome in this ice if you're happy to discuss those things and it was one of those where debate because he says they were falling you know in the nineteen forties and fifties and the families just can't afford to keep them on anymore and that a labour government demanded the risk very high taxes and this was one of hundreds of calls see if only because of these paintings so we've lost so many other super similar but this one's there because of the spending you know so it's still that's sort of questions what gets to see if a place is quite interesting it is very interesting to think about the value of things right if you can come down and think about things of historical significance that may be easy to choose like I was reading this morning about and our archaeological discovery and almost fully intact tent made out of all the parts of a mammoth and its claim to fame is that it's one of the most early examples of architecture mmhm like how incredible is it to be able to say that you have that in your museum so you can say that the thing that you have is the first or an early example up or something incredibly unique that's often unique and rarity ultimately is what makes things very important museums happens like what's worthy of being on display is often a matter of what they have access to sometimes museums can be dumping grounds for donations of people I had a really interesting conversation and interviews part of my book with an exhibition director at the Houston museum of natural science we're standing in the great hall and emotions around and he goes out everything is trash everything in this museum is trash and I was like come again everything is strange because he was saying you know at some point or another it was something that someone didn't want anymore because if they really wanted it you know they would hold on to it for it and want to have it for themselves so either they didn't want it or they passed away and there are errors didn't want it anymore and gifted it to the museum so that's another interesting way that things end up in museums and then because they're in a museum there's this inherent perception of value because it's institutionalized right so a very interesting conversation nine I hadn't heard of that way of thinking about it before bed makes total sense I have managed to see behind the scenes a little bit one time enemy see and when I was doing my PhD research the curator of the Ulster museum in Belfast ways show me some things because I was using something from their permanent collection notice %HESITATION yeah I just needed to watch and study it yeah she's great she gave me this very quick sure and the stage spaces of the museum and there's just all these great art works and sculptures sins you artifacts and drawers and drawers and shelves and shelves for the boxes and everything and she said everything here is virtually of display everything here could be I tired sometimes we circulate stuff but people have their favorite Sir things right there that people just come here specifically to saying they want to see their Spanish Armada clean say want to see a bit already beaten up cost of a T. rex skills well we've got actual dinosaur fossils here but they're just these tiny fragments of things people find on a peach but the real threats of actually awhile fossilized bits of voxel dinosaur it's the iceberg this thing is suppose of what we see in a museum is just the one tense you know the nine ten Sunder is everything inside the box and we don't get to see absolutely would you or someone you know make a great cast an audio visual cultures then email audio visual culture shock dot com to have a conversation they can see Sir anything else told that you really like to chat about it today I feel like I've thrown a lot of questions out but if there's anything you told that you think it's really important that you have a just a message right there for people anything is holy crap the youth like to say yeah one thing I'd like to come back to that I briefly alluded to early on in our conversation and the importance of museums are why they matter why should we bother why should we visit them from what we discussed museums are places where cultural heritage is preserved and if we are not supporting those institutions visiting them what happens to all of those things do they continue to be preserved not even just professionally but just at all we are what we lose when we lose history you know there's all of these doom and gloom concepts of like %HESITATION we're doomed to repeat it but what I'm thinking of is just the learning opportunities the immersive exhibits the moments that things come alive really in your mind not only are they great spaces a community but ultimately preservation of human culture so I want to encourage people to visit support experience with your loved ones museums in all their glory that's great pretty good message and important message I can see where can we find out more at the union about your back you can read more about me and the book at mackenzie frankly dot com pretty easy to remember you can find the book on the ever ubiquitous Amazon dot com you can also find my book on bookshop dot org which I encourage people to support as well to support independent bookstores across the world accents my interest not sentiments as well both mackenzie frankly it's been such a joy speaking with you today you're very welcome back anytime if you ever wanna talk about a specific saying %HESITATION that you're working on or if you have a new project coming I it's you know just give us a show you're welcome back anytime and it's been pretty tough each day mazing thank you so much it's been such a joy talking to you and I look forward to more checks in the future