OhiO Wednesday’s October 2020 session created a space for Samantha Hookway to gain feedback on an on-going project where many roles and hats are held by Samantha within her collective studio, Studio Alight. The project at its heart is the designing and developing of E.A.T. Spatial which is a semi-digital, semi-physical exhibition experience and a mix between the site-specific and the website-specific. Academic conferences are now seen naming the merging between meeting digital and meeting physical “phygital”, yet, E.A.T. Spatial is more experimental than just mixing the meeting modes - it also aims to experiment in blending modes of physical media and digital media art-viewing inside the physical space a gallery. Hookway went on to include that the debut exhibition beaming out from Gothenburg’s own, ICIA Konsthall, is another task Hookway has taken on - the curator. And that a group exhibition with international artists included titled MANIPULATIONS is E.A.T. Spatial’s debut exhibition. MANIPULATIONS opens NOV. 14 at 17:30 at e.a.t.spatial.hub.earth.
The OhiO W. discussion space gave room for a discussion of how E.A.T Spatial shall function and its future capabilities whereas the space developed could allow for more uses than just the exhibition MANIPULATIONS itself. Also, questions of how did you get here, where is the funding coming from, how are you getting the word out about this project and how do you feel about taking on the role of a curator were asked and the conversation meandered in an interesting way between thoughts on the digital and spatial, the curatorial, the technical and the hands-on about ”how to”.
More information on Hookway and her work with Studio Alight can be found at www.studioalight.com and e.a.t.spatial.hub.earth.