Underworld

David Cotterrell's work for the theatre, Underworld, was chosen as part of the Unicorns three year consultation with 30 children from Tower Bridge Primary School. The children helped Unicorn choose Cotterrell's work after interviewing a total of six artists and discussing issues surrounding public art commissioning with the Unicorn. Commissioned as an integral and permanent component of the new Unicorn theatre for children on London's South Bank, Underworld is an evolving yet permanent new media artwork. When describing the background to the piece, Cotterrell stated Underworld is an alternate virtual space which meets with the physical architecture of the Unicorn through an illuminated screen. The screen is a formal addition to the building in that its shape and position reference the architectural principles of its context, but it is also a window onto another landscape. Underworld takes the form of an LED screen that is embedded into the floor of the Unicorns foyer. The imagery of Underworld is algorithmically generated, rather than animated and shows a continuously evolving urban environment. Rendered cinematically in real-time according to mathematical instruction and parameters, the cityscapes will evolve in a way that is governed by principles extracted from competing twentieth century theories of urban design and town planning. Placed just over one meter below the floor constructed from 24 tiles of Barco ILite 6 MD making a total area of 3.58m x 1.34m.