Factory
Factory is a site-specific video installation that takes a playful look at the industrial legacy of Vancouver’s Yaletown district and its recent transformation into a locale for design, fashion, gaming and communications businesses. Factory received the People’s Choice Award at the 2011 edition of the Illuminate Yaletown festival.
During the Illuminate Yaletown 2011 festival, Factory transformed the facade of 1060 Homer Street to reveal the mysterious origins of the purse-dog: a heart-warming story about the union of chihuahua and handbag. A large-scale, 5-channel video installation projected onto the Hamilton Street windows told the story Tuckfield & Sons, manufacturers of fine accessories for discerning ladies and gentlemen. During a 20-minute loop the entire production and sales chain of Tuckfield’s meticulous hand-crafted manufacturing were played out across several adjacent windows of a building facade. Like a glimpse into Willie Wonka’s Chocolate Factory, visitors were offered a peek into the inner workings of this establishment and also a chance to reflect on their own experience of the district. Although playful and humourous, in appearance Factory’s narrative addresses underlying issues of urban de-industrialization and the processes by which urban development is historicized.
Factory was produced in cooperation with the business tenants of the 1060 Homer Street and with the support of the Yaletown Business Improvement Association.
The Urban Video Collective is a project team of the Vancouver Design Nerds Society, a not-for-profit organization that facilitates interdisciplinary discussion and collaboration between designers, artists and the public.
Since 2005 the Nerds have been undertaking various public art and design projects, including large-scale, multi-channel video installation works. The Urban Video Collective includes architect Mark Ashby, filmmaker Hans Christian Berger and graphic designer Alex Grünenfelder, in collaboration with animators Phil Johnston and Richard Pearce.
Specializing in site-specific video installations, we create work that integrates with the built environment and responds to social, historical and architectural contexts in a manner that is both playful and insightful. Our goal is encourage a more imaginative perception of the urban world.