Active Ingredient was an award winning artist-led collective founded by Rachel Jacobs,Matt Watkins, Gareth Howell and Zini Pandya in 1996, later joined by Robin Shackford. Active Ingredient created interactive artworks that toured nationally and internationally between 1996 and 2013. They were pioneers of digital and web art in the early days of the internet, creating a precursor to YouTube through their live streaming video channels developed between 1999-2007 and their early locative mobile phone games, developed with the Mixed Reality Lab and Hewlett Packard from 2005-2007.

They collaborated regularly with other artists, musicians, researchers, workshop facilitators, galleries, curators, scientists, technologists and designers.

By 2013 the members of the collective who remained paused working together under the banner of Active Ingredient, whilst they each continued making artworks, cooking, writing, lecturing, teaching, designing, making, researching, being part of communities and engaging communities.

In 2024, Active Ingredient returned to begin an archiving project of their pioneering interactive artworks and hosting the longitudinal and ambitious ‘When The Future Comes’ project.

Key Artworks 2007-2013

Key Artworks 2000-2006

Key Artworks 1996-2000