Cyanobacteria is stunningly beautiful. The limpid blue-green colour swirls in water, coating everything in its vicinity with a lustrous neon sheen. Yet the algae, created by excess phosphorous, is massively harmful to waterways.
For several summers now, there have been huge algal blooms of the stuff in the UK’s largest lake, Lough Neagh. This is a phenomenon that has scientists very concerned, not least as this is where a large part Northern Ireland’s drinking water comes from.
Now artist Ami Clarke has made the vibrant yet dangerous bacteria the subject of a project at Banner Repeater. The tiny gallery, perched on Platform 1 of Hackney Downs station, is the perfect venue for Clarke’s video-based work, entitled Meeting the Lough On Its Own Terms.
In preparing this show, she spent two years working alongside environmentalists and studying the detrimental effects of algal blooms on everything from eel fishing and Lough Neagh fly to local swimming spots.
The installation features screens operating in tandem – one made up of an entire wall of the gallery, with smaller TV-style flat screens on top of it. Viewers sit mesmerised by close-ups of cyanobacteria in all its beauty, while overlaid text narrates the science and the politics that have led Lough Neagh to its current predicament. For those wanting to get further involved, Clarke’s project also includes a series of workshop and events.
The guilty phosphorous largely comes from agriculture and wastewater, and its presence raises questions about how we relate to nature – is it just a resource for us to exploit, or is it something to which we have a collective right? Does our relationship with the world around us need to be transactional, or can we somehow live in synthesis with the environment?
These themes are explored poetically in the videos, as chunks of text coordinate with the colour and shapes behind them, taken from drone footage and underwater filming. A soothing soundtrack of gurgling water and singing birds makes you almost forget you are at a train station.
If you are keen to reconnect with nature, interrupting your daily commute with a brief immersion in algal blooms is a lovely and thought-provoking place to start.
Meeting The Lough On Its Own Terms
Until 23 May (12.00pm-6.00pm on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays)
Banner Repeater
Platform 1, Hackney Downs Station
Dalston Lane E8 1LA
Bannerrepeater.org
