Patrick Jameson @ Sierra Metro

Patrick Jameson’s installation Eliel will be the third show at Edinburgh’s exciting new art space Sierra Metro. It promises to be interestingly varied, comprising digital animation alongside a series of sculptural objects, some of which will perform a soundtrack to the exhibition. If possible, it would be wisest to come on the preview night when there will also be a live set from Konx Om Pax, maker of soundscapes and animations.

Jameson’s installation takes its name from the Finnish architect Eliel Saarinen who designed the Finnish pavilion for the 1900 Paris Exposition. The show is inspired not only by the aesthetics of the pavilion building itself but also by the chunk of rock that it housed, the Bjurböle Meteor. The beautiful black glass-like material, which fell to earth in 1899, symbolises a link between the material and the sublimely out-of-this-world. Jameson’s animation, which forms the dominant part of the exhibition, shows the physical building from a perspective which draws attention to its less conspicuous patterns and relationships. In identifying different traits as significant, Jameson changes our perception of objects; he calls his work “proposals for new understanding of the material world.”

Jameson’s work may not leap to the same conclusions as the man who finds a watch on the beach, but it does encourage the viewer to try to understand the world in a new way, and look for something “more than nature or human endeavour”. [Mark Herbert]