Virtual Control - Security and the Urban Imagination

Playfully walking between urban facts and fictions, this exhibition by artist/photographer Max Colson presents a series of investigations on controlled urban areas.

The focus is privatised public space – urban environments which are nominally public, but owned and managed by commercial entities. The images on display explore how carefully camouflaged surveillance technology is used to monitor these areas, and, potentially, to manipulate behaviour. Other parts of the exhibition look at how these spaces are marketed and present an idealized version of urban environments.

Whether documenting the networks of sensors designed to 'track' suspect individuals or exploring how plants are used to disguise security architecture, this exhibition suggests how paranoia intrudes upon the urban imagination.

Max Colson is an emerging British photographer with a keen interest in using fictional stories and characters to explore issues relating to the control of urban space. This exhibition has been developed in collaboration with the UCL Urban Laboratory and has been generously supported by an artist in residence grant from the Leverhulme Trust.