2003's cyber-space odyssey

The Canadian multi-media mogul Rokeby takes to the streets of London for his latest project

Art is no longer confined to the walls of hushed galleries: the multi-media installation is less a passing technological fascination than an institution of the contemporary artworld. Taking this modern approach one step further, the Canadian artist Rokeby's latest project makes himself the artpiece, and moves the gallery onto the streets.

Setting out on Tuesday from the Greenwich Meridian Line, Rokeby will become an urban cyber-nomad on a 40-day "pilgrimage" through London. With the help of a digital camera, portable computer and brainwave monitor, and a global positioning system, the artist will leave a digital trail of his experiences on a website. Still images, video and electrical signals from his cyborg's "brain" will be recorded online; people can not only track his progress from afar, but also log on and communicate to him: like gods from virtual-space, they can tell him where to go.

Several of the non-negotiable destinations, though, have already caused controversy. Rokeby plans to visit the Peckham estate where schoolboy Damilola Taylor was murdered, as well as the sites of the 1999 nail bombings in Brixton and Soho. The artist says he will create "memorial sculptures", confronting what he calls an "age of amnesia". However, as with his controversial portraits of Diana, Princess of Wales – Blood Diana and Metal-crash Diana – which were broadcast on video billboards in Times Square, New York and Leicester Square, London in 2000, Rokeby has been criticised for his lack of sensitivity in dealing with events that are very personal to many people.

Moreover, cynics argue that his cyber-journey is simply the online version of reality TV. Aware that this project could be seen as a gimmick, Rokeby emphasises that his motive is to "remember death and also to throw light on the injustices and the imbalances of where and how certain people have died..."

Rokeby aims to reawaken a sense of the spiritual by using the very technology that has come to define an age of spiritual loss. Likening his journey to those of the Australian Aborigines, the artist's idea is to map spiritual "songlines", with the ongoing readings of his brainwave signals to create online music. "I am already receiving hundreds of emails a day giving me directions in terms of where to go, [people's] ideas of where a spiritual or sacred place is – I'm learning from them."

There is something romantic about this idea of a "people's trail", when so many Londoners are simply too busy to walk and meditate in their city. "They are living their lives so fast that I think that sometimes they are desensitised to the beauty... Just the moss or the graffitti on the wall – everything is an artwork," he muses.

MEMEX: a Cyborg Pilgrimage in the Age of Amnesia will be launched at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, Park Row, London SE10, and online at www.memex.org.uk, on Tue, 12pm (further info on 020-7729 9616; email on rokeby@hotmail.com