I’m currently on the train back to
Suffolk, even though it’s only a two hour journey the dynamic changes when I
move back to the countryside for modicum amounts of time. Losing the ability to
see contemporary art on a daily basis, having a shop a few minutes walk away
and the autonomy and free will to do whatever you want to do. Although isn’t
that the beauty of going home for Christmas? Anyway, this week was slow,
de-installed the exhibition, (kind of) made two new works and the open call for
issue 4 being published alongside an exhibition or two.
So, beginning with some new work, kind
of a culmination of the body of work I’ve been producing this year relating to
SIM cards, communication or lack thereof and the constraining authoritarian
laws currently being passed around the world regarding surveillance and
internet restrictions. As I still have just a bunch of SIM cards in the studio,
alongside all the debris from the past pieces, I’ve been stuck in a mindset
that I should use these materials because of a monetary investment. Obviously
not the best way to progress forward, but they’re all used now so that work is
finished with, after five or so works were made. Anyway, the work
produced/finished this week was the tower piece from before, accompanied by a
modified drone. Unfortunately, due to bad craftmanship, the tower kept
breaking, the cards popping off from each other, ruining the perfect tower
aesthetic and making a new piece in a way. The data tower, or lack of data
tower, SIM card-less, begins to crumble and die, with the drone being ornated with
SIM cards, taking off and abandoning the tower in a way, after striping it off
its resources. This could obviously be interpreted in a number of ways, from
creating a rich harvesting from the poor narrative related to information
hierarchies, or hierarchies of technology, or the use of data, or too much data
and communication, in a space taints the environment, corrupts and destroys.
Yeah, I think I’m happy with how it’s come out, and kind of dislike how it’s
split apart. Maybe when I return I’ll fix it properly and it’ll be back to how
it was, who knows. On a side note, I’m getting a lot better flying the drone,
it’s very fun. I’m not sure what to call the piece right now, maybe Search and Destroy, referencing video
games and the gamified nature of society and living in general? Potentially.
The second work that was produced,
again utilising SIM cards, was slightly influenced by Dani Ploeger’s show last
week with regards to fascist states and spaces using old war weaponry whilst
utilising new technology like GoPro’s and iPhones to document their escapades.
Taking two different SIM card companies, one primarily UK based, used for
international calls and sold in corner shops across London, the other EE, a
multinational company that operates on a global scale. So, taking these two
different companies I then, taking inspiration from various books and films,
envisioned the war’s that will occur in the future between different companies,
different corporations fighting to control the market in a hyperconnected world.
So using the SIM card carriers as a base alongside some MDF (which I’m using
way too much of now), I then utilised some army figures, dressed in
stereotypical army fatigues, chopped off their heads and replaced them with SIM
cards. The two platforms each hold one soldier, visually identical one another,
ready for or involved in battle. In the future, when the internet has died, we
will have SIM cards for heads and use WW2 era weaponry to fight for
multinational corporations. So yeah, that’s that. I quite like how these small
pieces have turned out, and could easily be built into a series of works. I’m
thinking of calling them Post WW3, or
something to that effect.
That’s the two works, now for isthisit? stuff, beginning with the
online exhibition I’ll be curating in the next week, featuring a few great
artists; Jakob Kudsk Steensen, Constant Dullaart, James Bridle, Rachel Lamot,
Ann Hirsch, Olga Fedorova, Eva Papamargariti, Iain Ball, Sebastian Burger and Andy
Holden. I wanted some others, but when people don’t get back to you, what are
you gonna do. It will be looking at surveillance, corporate online spaces, etc,
etc. The exhibition is called Why don’t
we get a kickstarter going for an ISP?, taken from a Reddit post, of course
and goes live tomorrow. This is the accompanying text:
After the recently
publicised death of net neutrality in the United States the general populace
finds themselves once again asking the question, what happens now? Over the
course of 2017 the global community has encountered a tidal wave of scenarios
that would have seemed absurd only a year before, from alternative facts
becoming a buzz word eagerly dancing off the tip of your tongue to news
channels devoting large portions of their time to deconstructing obscure early
morning tweets.
As the fee-to-play
business model has become a prevalent element in video game development, with
corporate giants continually charging extortionate amounts for in-game
unlockable content it was only a matter of time before other sectors of
corporate society were influenced by this particularly ugly form of late
capitalism. Soon the information superhighway will have added restrictions in
every country. Artificial and unneeded slow lanes will become the norm,
throttling traffic and restricting your apparent human right to a high speed
internet connection.
Once villainised in
the news for their connections to the illegal drug trade, cryptocurrencies
currently make up more than 1% of the global money supply. Bitcoin continues to
fluctuate and grow, moving further away from its cyberpunk roots and becoming a
valued asset in many millennials virtual wallets.
In a world full of
uncertainty and hidden agendas disguised by post-truth linguistics, where
imagined dystopian futures are becoming present day scenarios how will the
digital landscape transform and evolve in a society that forgives and forgets
past discrepancies on a daily basis, restricts internet access and relies on a
continually evolving algorithm to monitor and monetise created content.
Information is power, and in a world where an ocean of conflicting ideologies
is just a few clicks away, I find myself wondering why we haven’t been
restricted already?
Ah another thing that I finished
working on was a new net art piece (kind of) for Jim and Sid’s new curatorial
project for the Christmas season called Add To Basket, taking eBay items and
making work surrounding them. I created a piece called Build A Drone, creating
a fictitious company that connected the consumer with sellers on eBay, enabling
you to build your own drone. You can see it by going here, not too bad for a
day’s worth of work - www.add-to-basket.com
I’ve also been invited to produce the
next issue of STIMULI, which is an online journal of sorts, the same people who
included my essay about trolls and Trump in their recent book. I’m not sure
when this will be, but you can check out recent issues by going here - stimulistimuli.com
The recent exhibition came down swiftly
and easily, although the cable tray had to be carried all the way home as it
was too long for the bus! I had help from a friend called Qianqian which was
much appreciated and now all the work is in my room, ready to go back to
everyone involved. I think it was generally successful, although it would have
been nice if more people would have been able to come, although I’m happy it
was squeezed in before Christmas and new year. New year, new outlook, or something
like that! Now I just have to think about how to use the cable tray in my own
work!
The open call for issue 4 was opened,
focusing on all things AI, machine learning, etc. It ends on the 20th
January (perfect dissertation hand in time) and you can find out more by going
here - www.isthisitisthisit.com/issue-04 Hopefully I can get
some more great people involved who I admire for this one.
I think that’s it for isthisit? stuff, probably. If you want
better updates subscribe by going to www.isthisitisthisit.com
Let’s do exhibitions, unfortunately
there was only a few before I left London. Beginning with the good ones; Beth
Kettel at The Zabludowicz Collection. It’s a shame, as the show is
predominantly performance based, with the remnants of the performance being
what’s left when you visit on a non-performance day. When I visited, no
performance, so I was encountering the ephemera previously used or produced in
the last performance, which is gooey and abstract until you encounter the accompanying
interview which focuses on the TV game show genre and aesthetic. I liked what
wassaid but didn’t feel it necessarily translated into the physical.
I also, for some weird reason, visited
the Tate Modern. One Two Three Swing!
By SUPERFLEX was fine, I had fun swinging? Was that what I was supposed to do,
as a supposed adult who now no longer has fun and feels like they can’t throw
caution to the wind and... swing on a swing? I dunno, I don’t see the
subversive side of that, I get that it could be subversive, but in reality the
Tate is full of families and children enjoying themselves. I has become the epitome
of a space that you just take your children to as a distraction, like the park
or in front of a screen. Rather than mobilising it feels like more of the same,
which is quite disappointing. Even though I enjoyed swinging.
The Modigliani exhibition was okay, I’m
not that big a fan of the paintings and didn’t really feel like learning and
reading. The exciting part of the show was some VR ‘transporting you into the artists’
studio’, which was actually quite informative and interesting to experience. It’s
interesting to experience these digital experiences in different forms in art,
from an artwork that’s been made by one person VS a whole team of people who’ve
probably been trained to create these virtual escapades. Anyway, that was fun.
The Ilya and Emilia Kabakov exhibition
just pushed how much money these people have, or have had access to with
regards to their art production. Apart from that, a series of stereotypical
installation art before it’s time, an absurdly long winding corridor that felt incredibly
negative to encounter, a whole train station reimagined as a platform for art. Just
very extortionate.
The Red Star Over Russia show had some
incredibly communist imagery throughout, propaganda posters littering the walls
that lead you to the gift shop. Why wouldn’t you buy a mug with the communist
logo emblazoned onto the outer shell?
Cory Arcangel at Tenderbooks was fun,
he was commissioned to create a window display for the holidays showcasing his
fashion line alongside his fidget spinner works and other things. More monetary
than anything, who wouldn’t like Fuck Negativity sliders?
I think that’s it, my lacklustre
exhibition list before going away for a few weeks. Now, films and TV. Let’s
begin with Paddington, a lovely film
which I should have watched when it first came out a few years ago. Just lovely
PG content that makes you smile.
I finally got the chance to watch Dunkirk, an incredibly tense film that
re-sensitives you to bombs and gun fire in films thanks to punctuating sounds
and a series of distressing character arcs. Quite brilliant, a shame I didn’t
see it in the cinema.
The Killing of a
Sacred Deer was brutal and very tense, throwing you into a world seemingly annihilated
of any emotion. It’s a must watch, from the director of Dogtooth and The Lobster.
What Happened to
Monday, a fairly dull over acted film with a fairly obvious/stereotypical
setting and plot. In a future world where a one child policy has been
implemented but seven identical sisters have managed to survive until they’re
in their mid-thirties. Having Noomi Rapace play all seven siblings is quite
impressive and what it means is that nobody within the plot is safe, akin to a Game of Thrones type scenario that sees
your favourite character of 3 seasons killed without a moment’s notice, so can
the different siblings. It’s very throwaway and fun.
In TV I watched Manhunt: Unabomber, telling the tale of the infamous Unabomber
case, posting bombs. It attempts to e gritty and an FBI agent becoming
obsessed, losing his wife because he’s too caught up with his job, etc, but in
reality I find myself bored by this obvious and overdone scenario. In fact,
this obsession and grit felt manufactured. It obviously is of course, but it
shouldn’t be noticeable, or you shouldn’t want to notice it. You should be
swept away by the narrative which I was not.
I actually found myself laughing at Daddy’s Home, which was very odd. It’s
been quite a while since I last laughed in a Will Ferrell film but this got me
for some reason.
I think that might be it? I’ve probably
watched some other things of course, season 2 of Easy, season 3 of Lady
Dynamite, etc. Anyway, let’s finish it there. Christmas is now happening, a few
new things are going to happen, considering exhibitions for the future and
everything else…
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