At the present time there are many areas of the UK where no cell phone signal can be accessed. Such areas, on the one hand, represent nothing more than a failing of the cellular network - breaks in the infrastructure that will eventually be rectified by future generations of cell phone technology. But on the other, the dead zones can be seen as pockets of resistance, territories where the drive towards connectivity has yet to penetrate.
Live streaming through the cell phone network has become more viable as a result of recent technological advancement and this mobile facility has enhanced our ability to enjoy remote 'live' experience. In the case of 'nature', however, it could be said that a 'virtual' experience falls short of meeting our requirements. Nature in its purest form has been understood to be something outside of technology and human manipulation. Yet, live streaming from the dead zone is an impossibility and perhaps in this way we can view the dead zones as a kind of intact wilderness. These live streams, produced using a portable router and battery packs, capture from the limits of the cell phone netwrok. They look into the dead zone regions where the camera cannot go without a breakdown in technology. At the edge of the dead zone the signal is weak and frame rate reduced to 1 frame per second. Like a dying pulse rate the upload speed struggles to maintain its delivery of 'live' experience. There is a sense that the zone has a power that annuls our culture of streamlined communication and invites us to physically enter.
3G Hinterland: Denge Wood | 3G Live Broadcast | And Then There Were None | Climbing Frames | Landscape with Ruin | Treasures | Bosson Heads | Home Comforts | Pattern and Symmetry |