Melanie Jackson
A Global Positioning System, 2006, by Melanie Jackson [in the exhibition room]
The new animated work A Global Positioning System (2006) deconstructs a hand-held GPS unit, attempting to trace each component back to its source. By animating the routes and methods of production, Jackson reveals an incredible journey from the rubber trees of Sri Lanka to the tin mines of the Congo, on to the production lines of China and finally to the palm of your hand. This voyage reveals the complex web of locations, processes, materials and labour that go into the production of this hi-tech consumer product, uncovering the paradox of the expansive infrastructure needed to produce a device used to locate just one person in the world. For the creation of this work Melanie Jackson had the opportunity to travel to China and spend time in an electronics factory, seeing first hand how the GPS units are manufactured.
Talk + Workshop “Building narratives with the news” [July 31st (quinta-feira/thursday at 21h30 in the Centro Cultural de Lagos]: Conversation with Melanie Jackson followed by a workshop about her work and animation techniques.
MELANIE JACKSON was born in Westmidlands (USA), in 1968. She is a visual artist interested in the effects science and technology have on industry, aesthetics and politics. She is attracted to stories of work and migration, and the circulation of ideas and people alongside products and raw materials. Her work often starts with news stories, tales that describe inventive means of getting by, of survival beyond the odds: and she uses a combination of animation, drawing, sculpture, film, video and printed matter. Melanie Jackson is a Senior Lecturer at Wimbledon College of Art and is represented by Matt’s Gallery London. She has been shortlisted for the “2008 Max Mara/Whitechapel Gallery Art Award”, and was winner of the “Jerwood Drawing Prize” in 2007 with A Global Positioning System.