‘The Human Clock’ is an installation devised by Janine Harrington, in which the passing of time is manually ‘performed’ as accurately as possible for an extended period of time. The action of constantly maintaining the simple string construction encourages ideas about urgency, productivity and labour.
In just the last few years, Harrington has proven herself to be a versatile and inventive artist, working with dance, installation, video, tablet devices and books as well as undertaking her own research. Interested in ‘relations between the analogue, the digital and embodied knowledge’, her work often focuses on familiar and ubiquitous concepts, such as the clock and our experiences of time. Also concerned with the relationship between the performer and the audience, her work, frequently takes place outdoors or in a public space, offering varying degrees of interactivity. This is also the case with the Human Clock, in which the audience can offer help, check and correct the performer’s accuracy.
Her other projects have included work with a BBC Performing Arts Fund choreographic fellowship and commissions for AIR, Central St Martins, Siobhan Davies Dance and Big Dance. Usually based in London, Harrington is also currently preparing her next set of works in her ‘ongoing algorithmic performance series’, entitled ‘People Make Patterns’.