Hallidonto (Graeme Gerard Halliday) is a Scottish artist originally from Dundee  based in London, England. His work relates to his “Cyborgia Manifesto” his main focus is drawing; "The essence of the cyborg became my own. The cyborg image has been an integral part of my childhood. The cold war had just ended – the cultural landscape of the '80s was very much rooted in the future, the natural feeling of that time was dystopia from the cartoons/films, I watched as a kid, the advent of console gaming: Nintendo, etc. The image of man was always his metamorphism into the machine, or the machines taking over. I identified with the cyborg image, and I wanted to be one. I identified with the concept of such a being, and it has informed my work to date. They are infantile and simplistic in their appearance but not in their construction, being drawn in one continuous line. The continuous line has such intrigue the build-up of lines mirrors the essence of double helix structures akin to DNA, that create these lifeforms.   

My visual discourse is motivated by transcribing the sociological developments of our age, the evolution of the flesh its reflection of the future state of humankind raises the questions of what it means to be human within an organic-techno-digital world, what was once flesh in an ever-changing landscape, I see my work as the neo-renaissance., my work questions our existence and relation to the organic and if we go to far can we call ourselves human, this anxiety, the flesh anxiety."

Hallidonto's cyborgs go a step further; his figures are devoid of all humanity- a testament to the suffering of the born in its struggle against the manufactured. Despite the symbolic nature of his work, Hallidonto’s cyborgs beg the question: what happens next? The result is a challenge to the viewer, deconstructing the remaining self-image of the human, the Cyborg forms are depicted in stages of life that are painfully familiar: birth, the past, family, death, sorrow and the future, the departure into a new being.

My manifesto presents describe my influences and my modus operandi. It unfolds my vision of humanity via philosophical context, this simulacrum of the cyborg image, now has an ontological reality. "

 

The cyborg is very much the symbol of this generation, I have been invited to present my 'Cyborgia Manifesto' at the Royal Academy and the Post Human Forum in New York, by invitation of award-winning philosopher Francesca Ferrando in 2015. Also by Luke Robert Mason at virtual futures and recently Central Saint Martins alongside Warren Ellis and Dr Jamie Brassett."

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