The exhibition is a harrowing assemblage of the darker tendencies of the contemporary digital aesthetic and the larger meta-narrative of the mass media network.  Featuring photography, video remixes of contemporary screen culture, multi-channel video works, image manipulation, glitch art and electronic music the exhibition is also accompanied by a web portal for extra content and work-by-work deconstructions (http://darkeuphoria.info).   The exhibition space and the web content seek to unpack the darker tendencies in the modern mediascape and to tease out links and synergies with the previous century’s techno-futurist obsessions.

A film maker and media artist Goodwin has worked with a  variety of mediums in the past and brings much of this to bare in this collection which in many ways is as much a commentary on the technology of our socio-cultural milieu as it is about the commodification of contemporary reality. Citing Paul Virilio, Slavov Zizek and futurist/sci-fi author Bruce Sterling, the works on display form the creative component of Goodwin’s phd thesis, Dark Euphoria: The Neo-Gothic Narrative of Millennial Culture.Visitors to the media space will not be provided with a traditional printed catalogue but rather each work will be accompanied by a didactic featuring a QR Code and four images illustrating the aesthetic – and cultural – progression of the work.   The didactic’s QR code will point the viewer to the relevant page on this blog site and provide a backgrounding to the work and how its development relates to the key theoretical areas as discussed in the artist’s PHD thesis, Dark Euphoria – The Neo Gothic Narrative of 20th Century Techno Culture.

The terms “Gothic High-Tech” and “Dark Euphoria” have been borrowed from a keynote speech delivered by science fiction author and cultural observer, Bruce Sterling, at Reboot 11 in Copenhagen in 2009 :

“In gothic high tech, you’re Steve Jobs and you’ve built an iPhone, which is a brilliant technical innovation, but you also had to sneak off to Tennessee to get a liver transplant because you’re dying of something secret and horrible. You’re a captain of American industry. You’re not like, you know, some General Motors kind of guy. On the contrary, your guy is really kind of like got both hands on the steering wheel of a functional car, but you know, you’re still gothic high tech because, you know, death is waiting, and you know not a sort of kindly death either but a really kind of sinister, creeping, tainted wells of Silicon Valley kind of super fun thing that steals upon you month by month that you have to hide from the public, from the bloggers, and from the shareholders. You just kind of grit your teeth and pull out the next one. A heroic story really, but very gothic. (Sterling 2009).

To access the whole keynote visit the Reboot 11 site for the video and Sterling’s Wired blog, Beyond the Beyond, for the transcript.

In order to experience the exhibition as it was intended including full access to artist statements and all summary theory related to each work it is advised that visitors to the space have a smart phone or iPad enabled with a QR Code reader.  Most phones will have a suitable application pre-installed on their device, however there are numerous options available in the relevent market place of your device’s operating system :

Apple & Android : Google Goggles

Apple : QR Code Reader for iPhone

Android : Droid QR Code Reader

Blackberry : QR Scanner Pro

The exhibition will continue to run in the eMerge Media Space at James Cook University, Townsville until Friday November 4th 2011.  Opening hours are Monday to Friday 9:30am – 4:00pm.

Opened by School of Creative Arts Photo Media Lecturer, Adam Brown, the exhibition was well attended by staff, students and local media arts enthusiasts many of whom appear in the images below.  I would particularly like to thank Vicki Salisbury and Aaron Ashley (Umbrella Studios), Eric Nash and Jak Henson (Perc Tucker Regional Gallery), Dr Sally Breen (Griffith University), Bernadette Ashley (Townsville Bulletin Arts critic), Jo Lankester (Brush and Press Studio) and Creative Arts Head of School Prof Ryan Daniel (JCU) for coming out in support of my work.

The event could not have happened on time and in the manner in which it did without the valuable support and expertise of the eMerge Media Space team: Richard Gillespie and Ben Van Houts.  And I would especially like to thank Elly Murrell for her ongoing support and belief in my work and this journey.