Matrix East Research Lab

The intentions in setting up MERL

Matrix East Research Lab (MERL), a new digital image research, has been set up at UEL, London, over the last couple of years, and completed in May 2007. We aimed to establish a research centre of new image technologies, bringing together artists, educationalist, technologists, researchers, and various interested communities, pioneering the ceative potential of working with digital image technologies. The centre is based in East London – the largest concentration of migrants and refugees in Europe, and a multicultural area where more than 100 languages are spoken, and many cultural traditions thrive. As opposed to the single voice and the single image, projecting the dominance of western culture through such institutions as Hollywood, we intended to produce an environment which is polyphonic and multi-image, reflecting the cultural richness of both East London, and the East from which those migrants have arrived.

The image editing compositing and programming used at MERL allows any number of independent video tracks (up to 36 tracks of HD video) to be edited together and displayed in synchronism within the large MERL studio, on a variety of large LCD screens, displays and projectors, in any configuration imaginable. Sound can be similarly displayed within the studio, allowing the creation of innovative virtual spaces, with/in which visitors can creatively interact. This new conception of the gallery space, as well as shaping a space is also undermining the tyranny of the single image/sound track, allowing and inviting a multiplicity of voices, images and experiences. MERL is now running training sessions for local and national video artists, installation and community artists, and for local migrants groups who wish to shape representations of their cultural communities. Increasing use is made of traditional and modernist dance, music and theatre, creating a unique combination of old and new, East and West, as well as some modernist and postmodern forms of theatre and video art, all making MERL a very special centre for digital image experimentation. To find information on the next training date, or how to join the training, please email the Director, Prof. Haim Bresheeth.

Apart from the work in the studio described, we are now concentrating on the digitisation of important research and community archives, such as the Refugee Council Archive, so as to make their vast resources available to the largest possible group of users. Over 10,000 community images will be placed on a website for the first time.

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© 2009