THE fear that in four decades water will be as fiercely fought over as is oil today is the subject behind Metal’s latest exhibition.

Opening next week, the group show displays new work made by artists in relation to the economics, politics, ownership and contested nature of global water supplies in the era of climate change.

Water is all around us, yet increasingly we need to take steps to conserve our supplies of it.

“Over the next 40 years, predictions intimate that water will be as contended as oil now is in the post-industrial and developing countries,” says a spokeswoman for the Edge Hill Station arts centre. “The artworks broadly touch on our relationship to one of our most important commodities.”

Peter Cusack has recorded the underwater acoustic ecology of the Rivers Thames and Mersey, resulting in a collection of sounds that remind us of the importance of listening as well as seeing.

Gina Czarnecki’s work Osmosis engages with important ethical issues that arise from developments in bio-science and the aesthetic uses of matter – literally the stuff we are made of.

Meanwhile, Simon Norfolk’s photographs focus on the contended waterways around the Scottish coast.

Other work includes a narrative-based piece by Paul Howard and David Matthews and a short video using footage taken in Patagonia, Death Valley and Baffin Island by Canadian filmmaker Annette Mangaard.

STILL: Conflict, Conservation and Contemplation runs from September 16 to October 22.