Helen Knowle’s immersive four-screen installation ‘Trickle Down’ opened on 23rd January.

I attended the final set-up day to photograph the completed installation ahead of the opening night.

Trickle Down, A New Vertical Sovereignty is a tokenised four-screen video installation and generative soundscape, which explores value systems and wealth disparity. The artwork is composed of auction scenes, performances and choral interludes by different communities such as prisoners, blockchain technology employees, market sellers, and Sotheby’s auction bidders.

The installation commences when a visitor drops a pound coin into a machine designed to expose the mechanisms needed to convert fiat currency into crypto-currency. The sensors, software and electronic components along with a read out of the blockchain ledger are exposed, embedded in a large sheet of glass. Each and every member of the Trickle Down community, who has helped the work come to fruition,  will receive a share of the ETH via a crypto-currency wallet, questioning: can technology be a unifying force to enable more equality in society or does technology only work effectively for those who are educated to navigate it? 

Knowles documented a series of auctions in widely different settings, which reflect the disparities in wealth and financial power individuals in different communities have. These include prisoners at HMP Altcourse in Liverpool, Ethereal Summit attendees, employees at blockchain company ConsenSys in New York, shoppers at Openshaw market in North Manchester and the Russian community in central London buying cultural artefacts at Sotheby’s auction house. Knowles photographed members of these communities during the bidding process, documenting their attire rather than identities.

Images of expensive handbags, jewels, fur and beautifully woven fabrics accompany sounds of rising numbers as cultural artefacts are offered for sale. At the opposite end of the wealth spectrum, bric a brac and basic goods are being bought in bulk at the north Manchester market and prisoners bid with their labour for plants to send to relatives for Christmas, during an auction staged by the artist exploring prison economies. 

Trickle Down, A New Vertical Sovereignty seeks to explore and provoke questions about labour, automation, value in art, decentralised sharing economies and distribution of wealth.

https://www.arebyte.com/trickle-down-a-new-vertical-sovereignty