Connectors,
Ubisoft Halifax
2023
Ubisoft Halifax
2023
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In May 2023, Sage Sidley began her six-month residency at Ubisoft Halifax with the following question: How does media and technology infrastructure—which is deeply embedded in everyday life—inform our connections with the environment and our surroundings? Throughout the residency, she examined and collected information and media from cyberspace, digital technologies, and data reports that discuss, depict, simulate, and reinterpret what best characterizes the look or function of a “natural environment.” This material was sourced from “places” such as Google Maps, Ubisoft Reels and its 3D assets library, but also from the artist’s immediate surroundings at Ubisoft.
Sidley’s final sculptural work composed of discarded hardware and five-video channels questions with a humorous and poetic gaze how technology mimics the environment to simulate worlds disconnected from the current climate crisis. Playing with the metaphor of the “bug” as both computer error and ecological invader, Sidley examines the blurring, problematic, and ever-shifting ties between technological progress and its impact on the environment. With the assistance and mentorship of the Halifax Ubisoft team, Sidley has created a 12-screen interface that features videos imagined as a waltz of recomposed images that repositioning the use of environmental representation through technology.
Visitors are invited to discern, for example, a server room infested with numerous of ticks, layered footage from videogame cityscapes, the Google Maps “person icon” reimagined as a pine beetle that dangerously gnaws trees in Western Canada, the Google trademark logo animated from incident reports from Ubisoft, and listen an audio track comprised of buzzing noises collected from her time in the office and from open-source libraries.
-Lisa Bouraly, Curator
Sidley’s final sculptural work composed of discarded hardware and five-video channels questions with a humorous and poetic gaze how technology mimics the environment to simulate worlds disconnected from the current climate crisis. Playing with the metaphor of the “bug” as both computer error and ecological invader, Sidley examines the blurring, problematic, and ever-shifting ties between technological progress and its impact on the environment. With the assistance and mentorship of the Halifax Ubisoft team, Sidley has created a 12-screen interface that features videos imagined as a waltz of recomposed images that repositioning the use of environmental representation through technology.
Visitors are invited to discern, for example, a server room infested with numerous of ticks, layered footage from videogame cityscapes, the Google Maps “person icon” reimagined as a pine beetle that dangerously gnaws trees in Western Canada, the Google trademark logo animated from incident reports from Ubisoft, and listen an audio track comprised of buzzing noises collected from her time in the office and from open-source libraries.
-Lisa Bouraly, Curator
This project was made possible thanks to the assistance and contributions of Talah Al Sharkawi,
Pauline Cameron, Gino Canovi, Adam Capone, Marcelo Careaga, Cristian Da Silva, Elliott Davis, George Greer,
Sherlyn Harrison, Janel Heighton, Pauline Jacquey, Jennah Keast, Rahul Khatal, Jordan Long, Tabea Marzlin, Ryan Miller, Britt Newstead, Robin Poirier, Natasha Small, and Kira Wigg.
Pauline Cameron, Gino Canovi, Adam Capone, Marcelo Careaga, Cristian Da Silva, Elliott Davis, George Greer,
Sherlyn Harrison, Janel Heighton, Pauline Jacquey, Jennah Keast, Rahul Khatal, Jordan Long, Tabea Marzlin, Ryan Miller, Britt Newstead, Robin Poirier, Natasha Small, and Kira Wigg.