Abstract

Living in an old textiles mill in an abandoned village to the North and West of Manchester in the fork of the complex tumbling currents of Pennine rivers that once powered the heart of the Industrial Revolution, I live amongst ghosts. They do not speak because they are the ghosts of Hands. The ghosts of Hands cannot speak because they are being watched by the ghosts of Over-lookers. The ghosts of Overlookers must be on the premises first and last by order of the ghosts of the invisible Masters. These premises were the property of the invisible Masters. The word, “premises”, itself is derived from speech – the premise – the aforementioned. Ownership relies on the ability to validate speech prior to its utterance. The permit of speech and the permit of the gaze is bestowed by the Masters. As described in the Rules to be Observed by the Hands Employed in this Mill for Water-foot Mill as printed by the appropriately named J. Read of Haslingden in September 1851: “Rule 9. Any person leaving their Work and found Talking with any of the other workpeople shall he fined 2d for each offence”.

• Professor John Hyatt, ISEA98 Chair, Head of Department of Fine Arts at Manchester Metropolitan University, UK, and Director of the ninth International Symposium on Electronic Art, ISEA98TERROR. Member of the International Board of ISEA (The Inter-Society for the Electronic Arts). John is an artist. After his first one-person show, he came to prominence as the youngest artist selected for The British Art Show of 1986. He has exhibited extensively over the last decade. In 1991, at thirty-two years of age, he became Head at Manchester and was awarded a British Professorship two years later. His practice remains wide and varied. He is also a musician, as lead singer with the legendary Three Johns, and, most recently, an author. His first novel, Navigating the Terror, will be published by Ellipsis (London) in 1999.

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