Fossil

In July 2000 Ufi Ltd commissioned Brian McClave to produce a piece of work in digital media that responded to our innate human ability to learn. Fossil is the result.

Fossil is a ground-breaking stereoscopic digital video that explores the evolution of human thought. It takes the form of an exploded lecture on the development of the mind. As the story of the evolution of our human and pre-human ancestors unfolds, the various themes are expanded upon using multiple layers of video. Each strata of video information occupies a separate space within the 3D stereoscopic domain, analogous to the complex layering of archaeological evidence. The systems used to study the past, and the mechanisms used to study the human body - particularly the brain - are displayed as a subtext to the central evolutionary theme.

The emphasis on language and tool-making as driving forces within our development as a species is a pointer towards the digital age which we are now entering. Machines for the transferal of information at high speed and in new complex forms can be seen as a natural progression from the first traditions in stone tool manufacture.

History holds many definitions of art practice. One such definition is that art is what happens when an individual responds in an authentic way to a set of circumstances. Social and economic factors are elements of these circumstances as are time and geography (physical and virtual). Art therefore, it can be argued, is an authentic response to a particular time, place, social and economic context. The tangible outcome of the artefact will be shaped further by technology.

The human race is curious about itself and its environment. Our enquiry and experimentation has created technologies that have impacted further on our understanding of ourselves and our world. This understanding and specific ideologies have further shaped our technological requirements - which further shape our intellectual development. Fossil is a response to technology and its impact on our mental evolution.