Three outdoor digital art installations are coming to a town centre to celebrate our evolving relationship with technology.

Ashford-based arts organisation AΦE Creative Hub want to celebrate how we use technology while also considering the importance of physical connections in real life.

ALT*ASH is a free, three-week-long exhibition of digital art installations across the town centre, aiming to connect people through digital art, running from Thursday, April 1 to Sunday, April 18.

Co-directors of AΦE Creative Hub, Aoi Nakamura and Esteban Lecoq, said: “Taking place outdoors, this year’s exhibition is especially designed for young people and family audiences and aims to connect different generations through playful and interactive activities.

"For this reason we brought into the town for the first time the work of two internationally renowned artists, Elly Oldman and Naho Matsuda, as well as a fun augmented reality opera experience developed by Welsh National Opera, Arcade and Xavier Segers.”

The Great Story of The Infinite Drawing will be a giant interactive fresco by Elly Oldman in the window of the former Debenhams store on Bank Street.

In 2017, Elly was stuck in her bed following an accident, and began creating an endless drawing on Instagram. Two hundred 2Instagram posts, 15m of drawing and 18,000 followers later, she created a giant and evolving interactive fresco, mixing drawing and augmented reality which tells us a wacky fable, against a background of ecological and environmental considerations. Visitors will need to scan a QR code next to it to have the full experience.

Naho Matsuda’s Every Thing Every Time, which will be at the entrance to the Ashford Picturehouse on

Elwick Road from Thursday, April 8 to Sunday, April 18 April, broadcasts poetry on a large mechanical display, urging deeper reflection on the role of data in our lives, personal privacy and our place in future cities.

This public realm artwork processes data typically captured and published by ‘smart city’ technologies and uses it to create poetry based on our interactions with the urban environment.

Life in the city is expressed as poetry on a mechanical split-flap display similar to the destination boards once found in railway stations.

A Vixen’s Tale on the corner of 53 High Street and 2 North Street, is a snapshot of the opera The Cunning Little Vixen in augmented reality commissioned by Welsh National Opera, created by Arcade with illustrations from Xavier Segers.

Fusing together music and theatre with digital technology, the whole family can ‘follow the Vixen’, meeting some of her loveable friends as they travel through the seasons. Short Instagram filters will transport visitors into a pop-up-book-style world where they will be inspired by Janáček’s music and themes around the cycle of life and nature.

By scanning a QR code on the first of four posters which opens an Instagram filter bringing the poster to life.

The project has been funded by Arts Council England, Kent County Council; supported by Ashford Borough Council, and produced by AΦE Creative Hub and with help from the sites' owners, Ashford Picturehouse, Stafford Perkins and County Square Shopping Centre.

To find out more go to aoiesteban.com/altash

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