Art in Manufacturing: Alina Akbar + Automobile Manufacturing Sector

Event Details

Saturday

11:00am – 5:00pm

Sunday

11:00am – 5:00pm

Age

All ages

Venue

Barton St Yard, Behind Prism Contemporary

How to Attend

Drop in

Price

Free

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VICKED: Alina Akbar + Awesome GTI & Performance M⁠

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The title, VICKED, comes from a regional pronunciation of the word “wicked”, commonly heard across Northern England and particularly within South Asian communities. Like the modified vehicles at the heart of the installation, the word itself has been reshaped through migration, local identity and everyday use, becoming a metaphor for the wider project: how people take something manufactured and make it their own.⁠
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Working alongside mechanics, technicians and car enthusiasts, Akbar recorded the distinctive sounds of modified vehicles, from dyno runs and engine remaps to turbo whistles and custom exhaust systems. These recordings underpin a new sound composition inspired by Bassline music, a genre that emerged from Northern working-class communities and shares many of the same themes found within modified car culture: self-expression, ingenuity, technical knowledge and a desire to stand out. The composition is presented through a series of sculptural speakers inspired by customised in-car subwoofer systems, where boot builds transform the vehicle from a mode of transport into a site of performance, and where bass, craftsmanship and personal identity become publicly expressed.⁠
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Through sound and sculpture, VICKED explores how mass-produced objects are transformed through acts of modification. From performance tuning to aesthetic alterations, the commission considers how standardised vehicles become expressions of identity, aspiration and belonging. At its centre is the act of rejecting the factory settings, where the moment a mass-produced object begins to reflect the person who owns it rather than the manufacturer who designed it. The work asks how people build meaning, status and community through machines, revealing the creativity and autonomy embedded within everyday acts of making.⁠

This Project is a Co-Commission with Blackburn with Darwen Borough⁠ Council and the University of Lancashire.

Exhibition Talk

3.45pm, Sunday 5th July

Alina Akbar in Conversation with Jamie Holman, Artist and National Festival of Making Board Member.

Barton St Yard, Behind Prism Contemporary

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Access

Access via Barton Street Carpark – restricted access due to single step and narrow doorways.

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About Alina Akbar

Alina Akbar is a Rochdale based visual artist and storyteller working across film, photography and spatial installation. Her practice is rooted in both personal and collective experience, often developed through conversation, collaboration, and being chronically online. She intuitively detangles the complexities of working class representation and questions of diversity, amplified through a cinematic eye.

Akbar’s recent work expands beyond the screen into immersive environments. Through layered audio and site responsive interventions, she creates atmospheres that mirror lived experience and blur the boundaries between memory, myth, and everyday life. Her work bridges worlds that rarely meet, inviting audiences into her lived experience of class divide through street documentation and the archiving of cultural moments.

She was recently awarded the inaugural Football Art Prize and her work has been shown at The Whitworth,Touchstones Rochdale, Aviva Studios and Victoria and Albert Museum Late. Her recent film Pardesi Raga is a permanent part of the Manchester Museum South Asia Gallery and was featured in the CIRCA Art Prize 2024.

Website