Technology gets a deep blue tint

Peter Fraser's muse is technology, writes Kathy Marks. He spent three years visiting high-tech sites around the world, including Nasa's Johnson Space Centre in Houston, to photograph computers and machines.

Tomorrow sees the launch of a new book of his work at the Stephen Friedman Gallery in London, featuring 11 pictures that are at present on show in Cardiff, the latest staging post of a travelling exhibition.

Fraser isolates small mechanical sections, such as the robotic arm, from their normal context and sets them against vividly coloured backgrounds in order to "invite a clear-minded reflection upon the technological sublime", according to the gallery.

Both the book and the exhibition are named Deep Blue after the chess computer that defeated the world champion Garry Kasparov earlier this year. The show is to move on to Cambridge and Carlisle later this year. Fraser describes his photographs as "portraits of an emerging social class", although humans never feature as subjects. He once said: "The sacred is everywhere, and resides in the most unlikely places."