Futuresonic presented NetMonster Bomb Blast as part of it's Art For Shopping Centres, exhibition in 2007

Harwood looks at the 'networked image' as an alternative to a personal view of the online environment clicked through page by page. The 1996 IRA bomb, which famously detonated just a few meters away from Manchester Arndale, provides thematic content splintered around the worlds media. The NetMonster software will sniff out links and connections, remaking images associated with the 1996 explosion from the content found on the websites of business affected in Manchester Arndale. The exhibition aims to give expression to a sense of interdependence, the sense that everything is connected to everything else. It is the culmination of a series of workshops and network meetings on free-media, exploiting the surplus of computers and electronics in society.

Harwood seeks to uncover truths forgotten in the light reflected from the endless shop windows, in an ever-evolving 'network image' showing how the Arndale and Manchester city centre have risen from the ashes of the 1996 IRA bomb. Coinciding with the date Ian Paisley and Gerry Adams are scheduled to form an historic power-sharing government in Northern Ireland, Harwood revisits the legacy of the 1996 IRA bomb, which famously detonated just a few meters away from Manchester Arndale. Harwood's NetMonster software searches the internet for thematic content, sniffing out links and connections, creating a living, composite image from images splintered around the worlds media.

More images here

Bomb Blast is one of the best documented of the NetMonster series.

This is the mask image that was used for the software to track down other images