Motion Disabled enabled

26 March 2009

Motion Disabled, an animated digital sculpture that explores ideas of normality and difference, has opened at Wolverhampton Art Gallery.

To create the exhibition, artist Simon Mckeown worked with 11 people with physical disabilities including spina bifida, cerebral palsy and brittle bone disease. He recorded their everyday movements using motion capture technology - a means of recording movements digitally, often used in the making of animated feature films. The resulting motion capture animations were applied to simple human figures(avatars) to create five 15-minute films.

Simon Mckeown said: “I used this technology to capture for now and the future the motions of ‘difference’, in order to ask questions including: do we value difference? How do disabled people’s bodies fit into current notions of normality? And, is physical diversity about to become virtual?” The exhibition, which was part-funded by a Trust People Award, will run at the Wolverhampton Art Gallery until 25 April 2009.