EGENIS seminar: Extraordinary moments of coronavirus crisis and Brexit seen through the lens of a new interactive art exhibition, Prof Katharine Tyler (University of Exeter) & Helen Snell (artist in residence, Torbay & South Devon NHS Foundation

Egenis seminar series

In this talk Snell and Tyler will introduce and reflect on their experiences, from the standpoint of their differing disciplinary perspectives, of producing an interactive on-line art exhibition designed by Snell entitled ‘Red Amber, Green Britain’ (https://www.redambergreenbritain.com/). Red, Amber, Green Britain is an online exhibition of work produced by Helen Snell during her tenure as artist in residence at the University of Exeter from September 2020 to March 2022, as part of the project ‘Inequality, Identity and the Media in Brexit-Covid 19 Britain’ led by Katharine Tyler. This research is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council as part of UK Research and Innovation’s rapid response initiative to COVID-19.

An Egenis, the Centre for the Study of Life Sciences seminar
Date	23 January 2023
Time	15:30 to 17:00
Place	Hybrid

Event details

We are an interdisciplinary team including an artist, anthropologists, political scientists and computer software engineers who worked collectively to co-produce this exhibition (See the project website for further details about the research https://www.brexit-studies.org/).

Together, we have been exploring how Brexit and coronavirus – and the inequalities associated with these major changes – have been covered by the media and experienced by different communities across the country. Examining these inequalities, and their potential effects on social and political polarisation, is crucial to understanding how British society will emerge in the future. The artwork is inspired by media images as well as photographs, screenshots and press cuttings contributed by people that participated in the ethnographic aspects of the research, that captured their thoughts and feelings about the phenomena of the covid pandemic and Brexit. To accompany the exhibition people can take part in a unique survey platform designed in collaboration with Laszlo Horvath (political scientist and team member). The survey is animated by looping visual provocations on a specially-engineered app (designed by the research software engineering team at Exeter), answering questions based on choices participants would make when faced with different scenarios – but from the perspective of an avatar they are assigned at random. The data will be used to create an evolving spatial map, displaying public opinion in real time. A version of this app formed part of the exhibition ‘Tracked and Traced’, at Science Gallery Detroit, September – December 2021.