Exhibiting together for the first time since studios closed and exhibitions were cancelled last year, a group of MA Fine Art students at Edinburgh College of Art (graduating 2022) have created ‘Error 404’. Presented inside a digital gallery space that floats in a boundless internet void is artwork from each of the sixteen artists that make up MAFA 2022.

To enter, you have to choose an avatar which then spawns into the elbow of an L-shaped gallery space. I like this aspect – you get to make a choice about how you appear to others in the space, and I’m used to occupying online spaces that are about other people’s work anonymously. From my left, Will Jack’s 3D scanned sculpture, Untitled (2020), sits next to Mia Takemoto’s Third Space (2020-21) – a gif created from a triptych of tempera paintings on wood. To my right, nestled in a top corner of the room, Isabella Inskip’s digital sculpture Moon Face (2020) floats its kind countenances in front of Pink and Blue, two paintings by Mizra Kara. On either side of it are Rhiannon Ferguson’s Vitality (Digital Edition) (2021), a wall-come-window that looks out to the void beyond the walls of the exhibition space, and Lingshu Feng’s haunting Self-Portrait Series (4), which is not in view from the spawn point.

Any slight movement reveals that the spawn point itself rests (beneath? inside? within?) another artwork: Hannah Grist’s Dystopian Interior Landscapes (2021). Four hand-cut and digital collages are suspended above and around, macabre bubbles frozen in mid-air, and as you move around them the perspective shifts, making it hard to tell if you are looking at a concave or enclave. They are a disorientating presence, but the details are familiar domestic objects – a table leg; a lampshade; some yellow fabric.

Sharing a wall with Vitality are Isabel Duffy’s collages Clouded and Cursive (both 2020); Olivia Humphrey’s short film (Don’t) Forget to Breathe (2020); Amelia Morgan’s Vanitas in 4 Part (2020); and Frances Driscoll’s (…) Just Wasn’t Made (…) (2021). The next wall hosts Ophelie Napoli’s Spreader (2020), a digital photograph of an ominous sculpture, and Imogen Luczyc-Wyhowska’s Spirals (2021), foregrounded by Dani Rothmann’s metalwork pieces Angela and Creepy Crawly (both 2020). Fiona Gray’s Cityscape in Pink (2020) hangs left of Emma Lake’s trio of oil paintings - A Bump in the Night, I Hope They’re Alright and She Tapped a Tune on my Ceiling accompany Silence, Please, The Building is Sleeping (all 2020). Her titles capture the indeterminate neighbourly noises that haunt the walls of the perpetually locked in – a reminder that, for students, art making is now taking place in bedrooms rather than studios.

This describes, but definitely does not do justice to, the product of a whirlwind of collaborative effort: having found out in only mid-January that no physical exhibition would be taking place, MAFA 2022 decided to come together to exhibit their work online. The end result of this collective is something of an artwork in itself: it’s important, Mia tells me, to remember the thought that’s been put into creating the space. ‘We’ve set the time of day to 6pm, and we really thought about where to put the spawning point. We chose to put the gallery space into a void because it can’t be done in real life’ – Fiona nods in agreement, ‘it could be tempting to create a digital space that just looks like another white cube.’

Whilst ECA has been promoting the exhibition, ‘Error 404’ is a venture apart from the art school. There is a consensus amongst MAFA 2022 that studio art simply cannot be taught digitally, and, despite kindness and empathy from tutors, the institution itself has been wildly unhelpful. Fiona describes a conceptual pedagogy that ‘teaches you how to think about art, but not how to make art,’ and Olivia summarises: ‘whilst our tutors encouraged us to do this, we view it as completely separate to our degree.’ As is usually the case with universities, tutors and students alike have been at the whim of the institution, whose layers of bureaucracy and slow chain of command suffer from the same broken or dead links that provoke an ‘Error 404: Page Not Found’ response code online.

Lockdown has unavoidably meant no workshops and no studio, and whilst it’s become apparent that a lot of ECA degrees just don’t make sense digitally, ‘Error 404’ is an impressive showcase for how creatively MAFA 2022 have decided to make the best of a shit situation. Going digital, of course, has its vices. For Hannah Grist, who usually works with sculpture, ‘there is something about seeing the art in the flesh and sharing the space with the work that I miss. The multi-sensory experience is a big part of my work. It’s been hard to have this stripped away.’ But it also has its charms: a 360 degree projection brings a new and interesting dimension to Dystopian Interior Landscapes; Frances Driscoll’s work, originally quite small, has been blown up to the size of the wall; paintings can face out of, as well as into, the gallery space. Isabella Inskip’s Moon Face ‘was a scan of what I made in plaster – the version I sent to them was smaller and very smooth. The texture was entirely Mia Takemoto: my version was very shiny, and it’s interesting to see what other people can do when you just send them a file.’

In a compilation of interviews the artists speak about how they have adapted their practices. Olivia, who produced the video, told me about the medium-shift from painting to video: ‘I switched to video in January. It’s a more intensive process, but you see quicker results and you have something to show people and talk about. I’m happy I can join the discussion about having made something, and be part of that again.’ Isabella adds, ‘it’s also nice to have people to speak to about having maybe not made anything.’ In response to a context where sociable studio culture is no longer a physical possibility, creating a virtual exhibition has fostered a sense of community that ECA’s closure has not been conducive to. ‘One thing I’ve found with MAFA is how dedicated everyone is to art and their practice,’ says Emma. ‘Signing up for a course that is 5 years long means your life is art. You live and breathe art or art history, and this is something unique to this collective: everyone is willing to be organised, and put in the time and the effort.’

This exhibition stands for something important in the larger political picture for artists and art students during the pandemic. It is testament to the support systems that are being forged and the art that is being produced against all odds. Whilst last year’s online degree show (which was just a website that you can scroll through) was met widely with dissatisfaction, MAFA 2022 have used free software to create a space that showcases the collectives artwork uniquely and successfully. ‘The university does not set any kind of budget for its students – all we got were the community and the resources and the space. And now we can’t access any of that.’ Arts education everywhere is under siege, and the uncreative response of universities speaks to a general pushing-aside of creatives for the sake of an institutional STEM kink. MAFA 2022 and art students everywhere deserve better, and ‘Error 404’ stands out as a striking and clever independent venture.

'Error 404' is open through March and can be accessed here.

To get informed about how students are responding to the disruption of studio based learning, check out the Pause or Pay campaign here.

Words: Alice Keeling

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