Today’s Artist Focus marks the launch of a new project that will be taking places over the festival period. Nathan T. Dean will be writing ‘First Frequency’, a story that is told in response to the events and exhibitions taking place as part of Frequency Festival. With the bare bones of First Frequency in place, and a few characters in mind, Nathan will place Frequency Festival into his fictional world to create a sci-fi story influenced by digital technology and revolution.
Using Tumblr as his platform Nathan T. Dean transports the reader into the world of a Hide-and-Seeker – a data courier who lies under the radar, secret, covert – who needs to deliver a piece of information from one side of the city to the other. The story unfurls as the Festival manipulates this improvised story.
First Frequency
When omnipotent creatures can manipulate the world at a single thought – less than a thought even – it becomes imperative to know exactly what is happening day in, day out. This is where your Hide-and-Seeker comes into play. Using outdated technology, and augmented bodies, these lasses and lads can transfer any amount of data up to a terabyte in size across continents within their own nervous systems.
Our story follows one Hide-and-Seeker, as she delivers information from one of these omnipotent’s called Angels, to an unknown client. The story is manipulated by the author’s world, as he – Nathan Dean – explores the Frequency Festival. Watch as the festival pushes the Hide-and-Seeker to her destination, as this improvised story grows out of what Nathan Dean sees at a true representation of revolution, the festival itself.
Prologue
Extract:
Interview Commencing October 9th 2013, 13:03.
Interviewer, Agent Zinc of Arecon: Level 6
Interviewee, Catherine O’Longley, redesignated: CathI
Extract commences
[…]
Agent Zinc [AZ]: What did you deliver on behalf of The Angel?
Catherine O’Longley [CL]: I’ll tell you what I told the other five bozos that came in here to try and rip that from me… go suck a…
AZ: Language. Behave.
CL: Are you always this pleasant with your hostages?
AZ: For the purposes of the tape I would like to explain to further Arecon employees that Catherine O’Longley came to us unarmed of her own volition
CL: And that is as true as whatever comes out of an Angels mouth.
AZ: Now, what would make you say that? Is this because Masterful:Dusk:Absence made promises it could keep but then decided not to? Is this because you were found, at [COORDINATES REDACTED], battered, bruised and broken and your precious Client was nowhere to be seen? You work for an omnipotent entity, who doesn’t even have to hire you with the power it possesses, and yet you still find you’re in the same awful situation you expect from any job you perform.
CL: I did my job
AZ: Yes, you did. An entity that can teleport suns across the cosmos required a human to deliver a package. That comes up on our RADAR. So what was in the package?
CL: Hide-and-Seekers never reveal what they…
AZ: For the purposes of the tape, Catherine O’Longley bashed her own head against the desk.
[silence for approximately 4 seconds]
AZ: Why did you deliver a package for Angel designated Masterful:Dusk:Absence? And what was it?
CL: Ok, fine I’ll tell you. Everything. From when I met the Angel, to how I ended up chatting to this ugly mug. For the purposes of the tape, I mean this kidnapper.
Who is CathI? What does she do? What did she try and deliver? And what are Angels, because they don’t sound like what we know from Bible School… Is this the beginning of a Revolution we aren’t even aware of?
Revolution in Writing
‘If I am to write characters, I have various traits I can pick from to make them full and interesting. But there is a problem. If I am to write a man, I can write the broken genius, I can write the bullfighting jock, I can write the lonely nerd, the plucky young hero, the jester and the quiet best friend. If I write a woman, I can write… strong independent woman. And the list of previous archetypes created I can pick from kind of dribbles out there. So my revolution is thus: I don’t want to write stories people want to hear, I want to write stories that people should hear. I want to write stories that happen to exist, whether they make sense or not. I want the world to grow naturally, and not be constructed simply to make a buck on some cinema market fuelled by adaptation and remake. I want to write characters of all ilks and styles – of all genders, sexualities, cultures and purpose – and to break down thresholds that box in what we regard as moral, correct and true, when really it might be suppressive and outdated. My revolution is a personal one, to make myself better as a person, and thus, as a writer.’ Nathan T. Dean
Find out more information about Nathan here.
Follow the project here.
Follow Nathan @NathanTDean
Follow the project @CathIData
