Digital Dystopia goes on show at jelly as part of Reading Climate Festival

Reading Climate Festival is coming to the town this June, and with it a Digital Dystopia.

The project is to be hosted in jelly, the arts-based charity housed on the upper floor of the Broad St. Mall, and is a satirical ad screen network that aims to provoke conversations.

It is being devised by volunteers from the Adblock Reading & Wokingham group, who say they have led several creative resident campaigns aimed at challenging new advertising screens.

This installation will be a mock billboard that satirises commercial advertising, and will be made from re-engineered e-waste. The group says the billboard is a series of video installations focusing on claims made in some advertising.

The artwork was commissioned by Adfree Cities and is currently touring the country.

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Adblock Reading & Wokingham, which is part of the Adfree Cities network, said they hoped the screen would raise the issue of advertising more visibly in the city. 

Claire Hawkins, co-ordinator of Adblock Reading & Wokingham, said: “Over the last few years we’ve seen more and more applications for new screens on our streets in Reading and Wokingham, and we hope that hosting Digital Dystopia as part of the Climate Festival will help people make the link between advertising and over-consumption.”

The exhibition as part of the Reading Climate Festival is being welcomed by Chloe Naldrett, the Big Oil Arts Organiser at Adfree Cities.

They said: ‘We’re so delighted to be working with Jelly and Adblock Reading to bring Digital Dystopia to Broad St Mall in May and June, and to be participating in Reading Climate Festival while we’re in residence there. 

“Digital Dystopia is a creative way to spark conversations.”

And artist Laura de Moxom, who is the general manager at Jelly, said: ‘We’re incredibly excited to be hosting Digital Dystopia at the Jelly studios, with thanks to Adfree Cities and Adblock Reading.

“We truly believe in the power of arts to create real and meaningful impact, hitting us in our emotional core and asking us to think outside of the everyday.

“This installation is a chance for our community to experience nationally touring work that is a provocation to question what we know and how the world could be different.”

When will Digital Dystopia be visiting Reading’s jelly?

The Digital Dystopia is a unique, freestanding visual art experience and will take up residence at Jelly in Broad St Mall for Reading Climate Festival, which runs from June 7-21. It is touring throughout the country in 2025.

Adfree Cities will be hosting an event on Fossil Capitalism and Surveillance Advertising on Tuesday, June 10, as part of Reading Climate Festival.

For more on the exhibition, log on to: adfreecities.org.uk/digital-dystopia