'Mobile World' comprises of eighteen film rainbow holograms - nine portraits* and nine still lives of vegetation. These were transferred from glass pulse laser masters to film. One portrait and one still life were placed back to back sandwiching a segment of a geographic transparency. The two sheets of film and the transparency were then enclosed in two pieces of glass and sealed with bitumen tape. The nine resulting segments were hung by twenty pounds strain fishing line.
'Mobile World' was motivated by three concerns: movement, man and the world.
The first strategy was to integrate a sense of movement, both physically and mentally into a medium which has long been faulted for its static, frozen nature. My inspiration was drawn from both early photographers and modern painters: David Hockney, Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, Marcel Duchamp, Eadweard Muybridge and Duane Michals.
Using a technique of image duplication it was possible to suggest movement psychologically and by employing a mobile configuration physical movement could be shown.
The second and third strategies are linked, those being man and his environment, specifically mass ability to travel globally and the impact people have on their environment and ultimately the world.
*Subjects for the holographic portraits include Liz herself, Jon Mitton, Jeffrey Robb and other contemporaries at the R.C.A.
Work shown in the exhibition:
MOBILE WORLD
1991
Mobile construction comprising white light transmission holograms on silver halide film, sandwiched in glass with acetate photocopies.
9 pieces making a circle 24" diameter.
View a full list of works by Elizabeth Coates in the Jonathan Ross Hologram Collection