Top to bottom :
Susan Sloan: Untitled, digitally animated figure in motion; courtesy the artist
Installation view, VAULT ; courtesy The Arches
Susie Johnston: Untitled, 100,000 steel ballbearings; courtesy The Arches
Uncle John & Whitelock: The Shack ; courtesy The Arches
3D spex; courtesy The Arches

Visual culture and club culture are converging and co-operating with one another in the formation of new modes of combined expression. The Arches, home to a wide range of contemporary cultural subversion, is Glasgow's most committed venue for the collision of visual art and dance culture. The profile of the Arches is changing - previously a club venue and home to the Arches Theatre Company, this massive space under Central Station is now launching artist's studios and performance spaces and is making a higher priority for art.

Following a multi-million-pound re-fit, the state of flux between DJs, artists and performers is continuing apace at the Arches. Several recent events have drawn on the merging cross-currents between dance culture and the visual arts. 2001AV opened the way for correspondences between musicians, artists, film-makers and VJs, including former Sex Pistols iconoclast Jamie Reid, graffiti subversive Banksy, and Coldcut collaborators Hexstatic. Hexstatic took part in a discussion on VJ culture (which notably concluded that the terms 'VJ' and 'video jockey' were both redundant and inappropriate), which showcased the technological aspects of club-visual design and the thorny copyright issues therein. Although Hexstatic's work is far from being mere eye-candy for psychoactivated clubbers, the discussion followed an unsatisfying path, seemingly emphasising randomness and digital effects over purposeful content control and emotional affect. Is there room for minimalism in club visuals? Is there time to consider the whole spatial environment of a techno event, or are we using VJs to provide non-narrative cinema for the ecstasy generation?

Attacking these questions from an entirely different angle, the VAULT exhibition is challenging in its range of possible answers. Curated by Glasgow-based sculptor Guyan Porter, VAULT invades the body of The Arches in an attempt to expose its soul. It is bursting with potential as a space, but it's a space which threatens to overwhelm; it's domineering and harsh, with no natural light, acres of red brick and a subterranean mustiness. This year VAULT features 14 artists and performers, using and mis-using the massive brick arched tunnels as a touchstone for installations and objects, and as a secret cinema for fleeting projections.

The variety of approaches employed make it an intriguing space to explore. The artists involved are brave enough to face the challenging space, re-vivifying an industrial no-man's-land into a many-dimensioned place of (literally) underground ideas.

Bearing in mind that the show is open to the public during the day and clubbers and music crowds by night, the show incorporates some interactive pieces. Dan Norton's Emotionally Clocked: Inside utilises a large projection and an even larger sound system to publicise the feedback between the operator and a computer program. Bizarre wiggling figures, exploding colours and blossoming forms are pursued by a cursor-arrow which forces the sound system to emit huge throbs and clicks. It defies logic when you are not directly manipulating it, but it is fascinating and quizzical. Computers are the tools of choice for many contemporary artists, but we are still discovering the thoughtforms of the human-computer interface and the possibilities offered by truly interactive engagement in the digital realm.

While the soundclash raged between Norton's work and the neighbouring DJs, another of the installations was being turned up to eleven. The Shack by Uncle John & Whitelock filled one of the brick VAULT s with a large wooden shack, reminiscent of a crumbling Alpine cabin and looking like it was held together by force of will alone. This structural integrity was threatened from within, as guitar sounds and a steady throb tried to prise apart the planks. Subtler works attracted lots of attention from clubgoers, who seemed genuinely intrigued by the presence of such delicate items in a place of such chaotic physical energy. Jane McInally's Landscape created a place of lightness in the otherwise gloomy tunnels - a nostalgic double projection work where sunshine, blue sky and the twisting close-up forms of pigeons formed a bridge to melancholic areas of the imagination.

Confronting issues of delicacy with foolhardy abandon was Susie Johnston's untitled ballbearing work. Using 100,000 steel balls to make a sumptuous lace-like floor-work, Johnson demonstrated a light touch which truly counteracted the sometimes brutal architectonics of the space. The ballbearings were set painstakingly into a resin base directly on the concrete floor, spiralling and sweeping into florid outlines. The steely surfaces and uncompromising lighting drew viewers towards what looked like a carpet of jewels. But a closer view was even more breathtaking, as the hand-made dexterity of the construction became apparent. This unprotected work suffered some unprovoked invasions, as the unthinking or bemused found themselves walking across this fragile piece. The placing of this work beside Susan Sloan's digital projection created a powerful resonance in the space. Sloan has been using 3D modelling and rendering software to create a compelling image of a figure constantly caught in the process of walking toward the viewer. Sometimes, surfaces and textures fall on the walking body and strongly delineate the form; at other points, shades and colours fade and the figure seems to walk into impermanence. The conjunction of this ghostly, relentless figure walking towards the slender and glistening ballbearing path produced an arresting and poetic sensation.

Canorous Coupling No 3 by Chris Biddlecombe and David Trouton was a surprising discovery, as it seemed to have been made to look precisely like some ancient industrial fitting left in the building by a Victorian engineer. Lovingly hand-made in oak and steel, the elements of this construction were connected together to form a curious listening apparatus which seemed to observe the sounds at the core of the building. Rumbling railway sounds filtered out of this strange machine. It looked very much like it had been made by a lonely craftsman in a greasy workshop somewhere in a railway yard. It seemed to be one of those unexplainable little hand-made constructions without which an entire technological system would tumble towards disaster. Poignant, and sensitively allowing the building to merge with its diverse elements, this piece looks as though it has always lived in the Arches.

Yes, I am still talking about a nightclub. The reverence and pre-ordained quest for meaning which a gallery space can impose on artworks are blown away here in the throbbing Saturday-night Arches. Just yards away from these quiet, fine works is a full-scale techno sound system. Several hundred screaming dancers are 'enjoying the music'. Even if you justify this kind of event by saying that it exposes a whole new audience to contemporary art, you only scratch the surface of why this is so compelling. New things really happen when art like this and music like this are put in a place like this. Sometimes the music can seem like a blunt instrument, and it's difficult for subtleties to show through. Sometimes the artworks can be overwhelmed by the sheer power of such a volume of hammering sound. But the conjunctions are more complex than that; and the interplay between spaces, images, sounds and people have an extraordinary, liberating effect.

Perhaps 'club visuals' have come of age. Some VJs now talk hopefully of having equal billing and similar fees to the mega-star DJs they work with. But this only sees the culture of clubbing as a competitive, economic phenomenon to be exploited for personal gain, and to many people, dance culture is exactly that. But others are involved in club culture for different reasons - they love the music, they love the sense of community and the opportunity to be creative, and they value a new arena in which to experiment with unfamiliar forms. Club culture has a strong dramatic edge, a powerful communal spirit and a hedonistic understanding of the value of celebration - these are a few of the things that art should have in common with dance culture. But this relationship goes much deeper. Without the artists who re-engineered the space and aura of the Arches, a vital catalyst to the imagination would have disappeared from the event. VJs and artists are not in direct competition with each other, but events like VAULT should be seen as examples of the alternative. With dance culture in Scotland increasingly becoming the preserve of multi-million-pound companies, artists need to provoke more activity in this area - not to bring in cash, but to get the opportunity to contribute to this strange new hybrid before it becomes just another instrument of entertainment capitalism.

2001AV , The Arches, Glasgow, March 2001
VAULT , The Arches, Glasgow, March 2001

Mark Dawes is an artist and writer living in Glasgow.