"HAVE YOU EVER HAD A POWERFUL GUT FEELING ABOUT SOMETHING, YOU DIDN'T PAY ATTENTION TO IT, AND YOU WERE SORRY AFTERWARDS?” GABOR MATÉ

Artist and designer Pod Bluman invites the public to participate in The Gut, an interactive experience that explores pathways of connection between human beings.

Bluman has created an agile audio-visual environment that reacts to participants’ behaviour, and builds upon the human instinct to build relationships, often manifested as a gut feeling.

Today, digital platforms and personal devices have created a paradox that sees us at once better and worse connected – with a greater number of connections of deteriorating quality. Despite encouraging openness and sharing, which often results in what could be considered over-exposure, social media in particular create a wall behind which we can hide – from where we can curate heavily edited, only partially true, representations of ourselves.

Bluman confronts this paradox, challenging us to be vulnerable and open when face to face with someone and somewhere new, and using this immersive environment to encourage people to express themselves in an intuitive, perhaps vulnerable way, bypassing self-curation and self-censorship.

“Most people believe that vulnerability is weakness, but really vulnerability is courage…(it) is the birthplace of innovation, creativity and change.” Dr. Brené Brown

With The Gut, Bluman hopes to help people transcend the everyday, to become more receptive to new ideas, to focus less on themselves and feel part of a larger whole.

All proceeds go to The Maya Centre - counselling for women www.mayacentre.org.uk