Output details
36 - Communication, Cultural and Media Studies, Library and Information Management
University of the West of England, Bristol
Curzon Memories and Projection Hero
Funded by one semester of Faculty-funded research leave and a UWE Early Career Grant of £19,019.00, the Curzon Memories Project consists of two related artefacts - the award-winning Curzon Memories App and the Projection Hero installation.
The research fuses new cinema history and digital media practice, taking digital humanities research into the mobile arena. The Curzon Memories App contributes to the emerging field of “locative” heritage interpretation by preserving memories and making cinema history accessible to new audiences via mobile media - using GPS and QR codes to trigger situated memories. The interactive Projection Hero installation situates the spectator in the role of projectionist, inviting them to gain control of a miniature cinema’s curtains, lights and projector on their mobile device using sensors and actuators to connect to the internet. Both app and installation use the affordances of new internet-enabled mobile technologies as a means through which to examine the “old” cinematic apparatus (as theorised in the 1970s by Baudry, Comolli, Metz, Heath, etc) as rapid transition to digital projection means that traditional forms of 35mm exhibition and distribution are becoming obsolete (see Output 3).
The research has been presented at numerous international conferences in intersecting fields:
• new cinema history: Screen (Glasgow, 2011); MeCCSA (Salford, 2011); MeCCSA (Bedford, 2012 - where it won poster prize); Besides the Screen, (Keynote, Goldsmiths, 2012); History of Moviegoing, Exhibition and Reception Workshop at NECS, European Cinema Studies Network (Prague, 2013);
• interactive documentary and locative media arts: Postdigital Encounters, Journal of Media Practice Symposium (Bristol, 2011); Electronic Visualisation and the Arts Conference (British Computer Society, London, 2011); i-docs (Watershed, Bristol, 2012); Environmental Utterances (Keynote, Falmouth, 2012); Differential Mobilities Conference (Concordia, Montreal, 2013);
• libraries, museums and heritage interpretation: International Museums Theatre Alliance Conference (MShed, Bristol, 2011); Art Libraries Society UK and Ireland Annual Conference (Bristol, 2013).
