If you could keep only one memory, what would it be? This is the challenge in the Memory Palace exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A).
I’m always a bit sceptical about exhibitions that are based on books; they are rarely as stimulating as just sitting down somewhere comfortable and reading the words.
There is also the tendency to reproduce a book on the wall, which leads to screeds of text. Shows about writers and their work often feel two dimensional and static.
The Memory Palace describes itself as a “walk-in book”, an interesting concept that immediately makes it feel immersive, as if the visitor is inside the pages and chapters of the novel.
Dystopic London
The show is based on Memory Palace by the writer Hari Kunzru. He was commissioned by the curators to write a book with the loose brief that they wanted to turn the final result into an exhibition and that it should reference the concept of a museum.
The resulting novel is an alarming vision of London in the future. In this dystopia all technology and knowledge have been lost and a dark age prevails; recording, collecting and writing are outlawed.
The narrator of the story is in prison for allegedly being a member of the Memorialists, a banned sect whose aim is to try to remember as much as possible of the past.
Because written communication and reading have been banned, the Memorialists use the memory palace technique, where memories are secreted in familiar rooms in a building, to aid recall.
The curators selected 20 artists to interpret the novel and each was given a short piece of text and left to create their own work based on it. This has led to a diversity of types of art being created.
In the book, time is divided into the Booming (before the apocalypse); the Withering (the present period of decline); and the Wilding, (a utopian future where humans will live in harmony with nature).
Graphic designer Stefanie Posavec captures these three ages in her eerily evocative prints. So for the Booming, when everything was measured to produce data, she has created an image based on the distances between all of the capital cities.
In the Withering these figures begin to disintegrate and finally in the Wilding, the measurements have become delicate plants growing out of the crumbled data.
Narrative structure
The narrator turns his prison cell into his memory palace and Frank Laws’s sculpture depicts his cell, with visitors able to glimpse the claustrophobic space through narrow slits.
Despite the very different material and artistic approaches here is a narrative unity to the exhibition. The plot of the book becomes the route through the galleries and, although it’s possible to jump sequence, the narrative prevails.
Some of the artists have interpreted the story literally. Illustrator Luke Pearson worked on a passage about the prisoner’s first interrogation and has created a comic book-like series of frames reflecting the narrator’s experiences. It is a bleak and frightening evocation of torture and the abuse of power.
Reconstructions
But there is also humour here. The novel is set several generations after the apocalypse and the meanings of many words have been lost. The Memorialists try to reconstruct these: a hospital is “a great palace of hospitality”.
London-based illustration collective Le Gun was given a piece of text relating to this to work with: “The doctors performed great feats of surgery and roamed the cities, looking for the sick. It was a time of great wonder.”
From this they created a sculpture made from text and graphic art depicting a chariot-style ambulance drawn by a team of urban foxes. In the back of the vehicle a medicine man performs surgery on the move. These misremembered meanings spark some interesting interpretations.
Type designer Oded Ezer imagines the different ways that type could be interpreted if you had lost the ability to read or write. He has created eight short films showing individual letters being eaten or set fire to.
His work challenges the viewer’s perception of what it is to read and what words and letters might mean to someone who has never been able to read.
The book and the artworks respond to many contemporary concerns: the excesses of the banking and finance industry; preoccupation with screens; obsession with technology; and sustainability.
Graphic designer Erik Kessels responded to two memory fragments about advertising and recycling.
“At the height of the Booming, sign was so plentiful that it fell from the sky like rain. It rustled underfoot in autumn and rose and fluttered about the palaces and hospitals like apple blossom in spring. This was called advertising.”
From this Kessels has created a church-like structure made from bales of recycled advertising leaflets, a comment perhaps on the waste of creativity and materials engendered by the seemingly constant onslaught of flyers and junk mail.
After taking the visitor on a journey through the chapters and artworks the story reaches its conclusion. I won’t give the ending away but it’s worth staying the course and weaving your way through the words and images to get there.
Genuine collaboration
At the end visitors are invited to leave their own precious memory. Graphic designer Johnny Kelly has developed a web-based drawing app that allows people to deposit their memory in a digital Memory Bank. These memories will eventually create a legacy for the project.
The exhibition is sponsored by Sky Arts and is part of its Ignition programme, which as well as documenting and showcasing arts and culture, commissions new art.
It feels like a genuine collaboration between artists – the writer uses the final artworks to illustrate the book; the words are the jumping-off point for the artworks. This is the opposite of a traditional exhibition.
Rather than words serving as interpretation for artworks and object, the words are interpreted through visual means.
There’s a lot to be learnt here. The concept and design are innovative and the collaborative element has sparked new content.
The exhibition leaflet is a model of elegance and simplicity, succinctly written, with a glossary of words from the novel, a well-designed diagram of the exhibition and an events programme.
The Memory Palace website also allows online visitors to leave their memories in words and images.
The end result is a book that speaks louder than words and an exhibition that is about much more than art.
I’m always a bit sceptical about exhibitions that are based on books; they are rarely as stimulating as just sitting down somewhere comfortable and reading the words.
There is also the tendency to reproduce a book on the wall, which leads to screeds of text. Shows about writers and their work often feel two dimensional and static.
The Memory Palace describes itself as a “walk-in book”, an interesting concept that immediately makes it feel immersive, as if the visitor is inside the pages and chapters of the novel.
Dystopic London
The show is based on Memory Palace by the writer Hari Kunzru. He was commissioned by the curators to write a book with the loose brief that they wanted to turn the final result into an exhibition and that it should reference the concept of a museum.
The resulting novel is an alarming vision of London in the future. In this dystopia all technology and knowledge have been lost and a dark age prevails; recording, collecting and writing are outlawed.
The narrator of the story is in prison for allegedly being a member of the Memorialists, a banned sect whose aim is to try to remember as much as possible of the past.
Because written communication and reading have been banned, the Memorialists use the memory palace technique, where memories are secreted in familiar rooms in a building, to aid recall.
The curators selected 20 artists to interpret the novel and each was given a short piece of text and left to create their own work based on it. This has led to a diversity of types of art being created.
In the book, time is divided into the Booming (before the apocalypse); the Withering (the present period of decline); and the Wilding, (a utopian future where humans will live in harmony with nature).
Graphic designer Stefanie Posavec captures these three ages in her eerily evocative prints. So for the Booming, when everything was measured to produce data, she has created an image based on the distances between all of the capital cities.
In the Withering these figures begin to disintegrate and finally in the Wilding, the measurements have become delicate plants growing out of the crumbled data.
Narrative structure
The narrator turns his prison cell into his memory palace and Frank Laws’s sculpture depicts his cell, with visitors able to glimpse the claustrophobic space through narrow slits.
Despite the very different material and artistic approaches here is a narrative unity to the exhibition. The plot of the book becomes the route through the galleries and, although it’s possible to jump sequence, the narrative prevails.
Some of the artists have interpreted the story literally. Illustrator Luke Pearson worked on a passage about the prisoner’s first interrogation and has created a comic book-like series of frames reflecting the narrator’s experiences. It is a bleak and frightening evocation of torture and the abuse of power.
Reconstructions
But there is also humour here. The novel is set several generations after the apocalypse and the meanings of many words have been lost. The Memorialists try to reconstruct these: a hospital is “a great palace of hospitality”.
London-based illustration collective Le Gun was given a piece of text relating to this to work with: “The doctors performed great feats of surgery and roamed the cities, looking for the sick. It was a time of great wonder.”
From this they created a sculpture made from text and graphic art depicting a chariot-style ambulance drawn by a team of urban foxes. In the back of the vehicle a medicine man performs surgery on the move. These misremembered meanings spark some interesting interpretations.
Type designer Oded Ezer imagines the different ways that type could be interpreted if you had lost the ability to read or write. He has created eight short films showing individual letters being eaten or set fire to.
His work challenges the viewer’s perception of what it is to read and what words and letters might mean to someone who has never been able to read.
The book and the artworks respond to many contemporary concerns: the excesses of the banking and finance industry; preoccupation with screens; obsession with technology; and sustainability.
Graphic designer Erik Kessels responded to two memory fragments about advertising and recycling.
“At the height of the Booming, sign was so plentiful that it fell from the sky like rain. It rustled underfoot in autumn and rose and fluttered about the palaces and hospitals like apple blossom in spring. This was called advertising.”
From this Kessels has created a church-like structure made from bales of recycled advertising leaflets, a comment perhaps on the waste of creativity and materials engendered by the seemingly constant onslaught of flyers and junk mail.
After taking the visitor on a journey through the chapters and artworks the story reaches its conclusion. I won’t give the ending away but it’s worth staying the course and weaving your way through the words and images to get there.
Genuine collaboration
At the end visitors are invited to leave their own precious memory. Graphic designer Johnny Kelly has developed a web-based drawing app that allows people to deposit their memory in a digital Memory Bank. These memories will eventually create a legacy for the project.
The exhibition is sponsored by Sky Arts and is part of its Ignition programme, which as well as documenting and showcasing arts and culture, commissions new art.
It feels like a genuine collaboration between artists – the writer uses the final artworks to illustrate the book; the words are the jumping-off point for the artworks. This is the opposite of a traditional exhibition.
Rather than words serving as interpretation for artworks and object, the words are interpreted through visual means.
There’s a lot to be learnt here. The concept and design are innovative and the collaborative element has sparked new content.
The exhibition leaflet is a model of elegance and simplicity, succinctly written, with a glossary of words from the novel, a well-designed diagram of the exhibition and an events programme.
The Memory Palace website also allows online visitors to leave their memories in words and images.
The end result is a book that speaks louder than words and an exhibition that is about much more than art.
Project data
- Cost undisclosed
- Funder Sky Arts
- Partner Sky Arts
- 3D design CJ Lim, Studio 8 Architects
- 2D design Sara de Bondt studio
- Exhibition publication Sara de Bondt studio
- Exhibition ends 20 October