Old media

Contemporary arts centre Arnolfini will present three exhibitions as part of its Old Media season, exploring the history of software art and the impact of technology set against progress, consumerism and globalisation.

Fun With Software will look at how software can be ‘experimental humourous and fun’ organisers say. A Love Letter Generator which was developed in the 1950s has been reconstructed by David Link for the exhibition. Visitors can remind themselves that romance is not dead as they write each other love letters in code.

A Coal Fired Computer will be on display in an exhibition by media artists YoHa which is trying to demonstrate the shift in coal production from the western world to emerging economic superpowers. A coal furnace rigged up to some synthetic blackened lungs are a macabre reminder of miners death’s caused by exposure to coal dust.

Heath Bunting’s Status Project will look at class systems through maps and portraits to chart networks of influence and mobility, finding that there are three levels determining class status today and that identity is a construct, she says.

All three exhibitions will take place between Saturday 25 September – Sunday 21 November at Arnolfini, BS1 4QA