Loving the Machine – talk at TEDx Brighton

Update Feburary 2011: Hats off to TEDx Brighton team who recorded all the talks and published them on the TEDx Brighton site.  You can see my talk here, along with some background notes and links to further reading.

On 21 January 2011, I’ll be giving a short talk at Brighton’s first TEDx event: Reasons to be Cheerful.

Read event details and see map.

TED is a notforprofit organisation which presents ‘ideas worth spreading’ in free talks and podcasts around the world. TEDx events are created in the spirit of TED – but they’re curated and delivered by local communities. I’m very excited to be appearing in Brighton’s first TEDx event, put together by Tom Bailey.

Here are a few details of my talk:

Loving the Machine

In this optimistic view of mechanisation, I’ll reveal some surprising connections between two types of dance music which flourished a century apart. Both were created by people were working to the relentless beat of factory machines. I’ll also give a sneak preview of my latest artwork – a simple machine which keeps perfect time with your heartbeat.

This talk uses some of my original research for the Science Museum, London, as well as the results of a collaborative  project with performer and historian Caroline Radcliffe.