Watching TV By Candlelight
"If it weren't for electricity, we'd all be watching television by candlelight."
- George Leslie Gobel

A one day visual arts festival is being planned for September 2008 based around renewable and sustainable energy and the revival of redundant power and propulsion ideas within new and future environmentally conscious technologies. The themes for the event and proposed work have been drawn from the parallels of the mill's 18th century waterwheel powered grinding mechanisms and the 21st century evolution of that technology into the electricity generating hydro turbine being installed on the site.

The event will serve as a re-launch for the re-developed Heron Corn Mill barn, and resident artist Nick Crowe's work with the turbine installation and barn conversion. The piece entails a thermochromatic colour changing floor covering the ground floor of the barn, laid over under-floor heating cables arranged in a specific design. When the heating for the building is turned on, a design appears in the floor. The work examines the relationship between people and the technology that surrounds them, the role of technology and its contingent effects on everyday life.

The free event will run throughout the day and evening on the Heron Corn Mill site with displays from fringe engineers demonstrating 'home-brew' and 'futuristic' energy devices, Steampunk exhibits, workshops, artist interventions and an evening music and performance show.