A slick and sugar-coated future that isn't what it seems

Marnie Simpson's new Virtual Reality project was inspired by her experience of living in Leeds - a city dubbed a 'northern powerhouse' and subjected to endless urban development. For Marnie, there was a risk that the individuality of the north would be lost in a race for prosperity.

In response, Marnie created LOOKOUT - a bright but bleak imagined vision of an urban landscape which is at once absurdly simple yet overwhelming. Presented in the style of a corporate advertisement from the fictional GovCorp, it explores what happens when urban renewal is driven not by local residents but by financial interests.

"GovCorp embodies the idea that we are governed by brands," Marnie explained. "It highlights how the combined forces of hyper capitalism are manipulating our lives more and more every day. We’re promised jobs and improved livelihoods - but in reality the overlords are dolling up Northern cities for outsiders with money. Post-Covid it’s ever more apparent how unnecessary all this is. All we’re left with is vast, dead space. Empty buildings and empty promises."

For Marnie, the Virtual Reality format was an opportunity to push the boundaries of satire. "I’ve always had an interest in satire within pop culture," she said. "Particularly how programmes like The Simpsons or Black Mirror are praised for predicting the future, when really they’re just projecting reality back to us."

The project offers a sobering glimpse of an imagined future, but for Marnie, working with the New Creatives initiative is just a beginning. "I envisage LOOKOUT as a prototype, and I would love to create new work to expand the VR world, to add more elements of interactivity in order to tell a richer story."

Marnie Simpson is an interdisciplinary artist working primarily in film, performance and sculpture. With an interest in bringing practices together in new and exciting ways, she creates interactive experiences that spark conversation and experiment with how we engage with art.

Taking on the overwhelming change of modern society with absurd simplicity, Marnie’s practice holds up a mirror and says ‘come and have a chat with yourself’, inviting us in with a laugh then leaving us unsettled as realisation sinks in.

With LOOKOUT, Marnie builds on her background in sculptural interactive performance with a new dimension of virtual reality, absorbing us fully in her exaggerated vision of our hyper-capitalist world.