Organic and inorganic, virtual and real, are the worlds that influence and commune with each other in the present, which is also reflected in the artist's creation. The surging news learned that the exhibition "Under the Skin, Between Machines" was recently exhibited at the Hao Art Museum in Shanghai, as the first exhibition of the museum this year, the exhibition tries to respond to the current situation of the intertwining of real and virtual today, showing the artist's thinking about technology and the virtual world from their own perspectives.
Under the skin, between the machines
"Man simply calls himself a man on its surface, removes the skin parsing, and the man instantly becomes a machine." When Paul Valery wrote this, he may not be entirely certain that today's human beings have been truly incorporated into machines in highly informationized, computed space-time.
Showroom scene
Starting from these questions, the hao art museum's group exhibition presents the recent works of artists such as Revitto Cohen and Tur van Barron, Simon Danny, Harlan Faroki, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Lu Yang, Lin Boyan, Parque Hardware, Jon Ralphmann and others.
The surging news reporter saw at the entrance of the exhibition that the artist Pakwe hardware's work "Yu" (2021) divides the work into 3 groups of sculptures with a ring bracket covered by a curtain, the flesh-colored curtain fabric reminds people of the skin, and the sculptures such as glassware inside the curtain symbolize the living organs connected by the laboratory test tube. "Yu" invites the audience to imagine together, in such a vessel, what will be bred?
The exhibition director and curator of Hao Art Museum paid to tell The Paper, "This exhibition focuses on the relationship between virtual and real. As the title mentions skin and machines, skins—people, animals, or plants—can have a layer of skin that points to organic matter; while machines refer to inorganic matter, as well as machines that today are no longer limited by physical forms, such as algorithms, data, coding, etc. We want to illustrate a point: today, we don't need to break down organic and inorganic, and virtual and real, because they have already influenced and communion with each other. The exhibition hopes to look at the two interrelated issues of technology acting on society and the shaping of technology by society from a critical and dialectical perspective. ”
Pacqui Hardware, Yu, 2021
Video: Showroom Scene, Jon Loughman, I I (Clip), 2021 (00:53)
Entering the exhibition hall, the audience can see the artist Jon Rafman's new work "I I" (2021). The artist unfolds the face created by 3D imaging technology into a two-dimensional floor plan, and accompanies the graphics and special effects related to the game and maps superimposed on the two-dimensional human face to form a ridiculous image. This is also the state of the artist's view of the deep Internet world, "In today's online world, the virtual body is becoming more and more important for building our identity, and the line between the real body and the virtual body has blurred. As we devote more and more time to screens, the importance of online identity to our physical bodies increases day by day, and when a person wears a mask for a certain amount of time, the mask is internalized into his personality. ”
Lu Yang, "Only Life, Only Death, Hello World" (2021)
Deep in the corner, artist Lu Yang's work "Hello World" (2021) is a highlight in the exhibition hall. Lu Yang collected and studied Japanese and Indonesian dances in Tokyo and Bali, respectively, and applied these character limb data to computer-designed virtual characters. In this regard, the artist also discussed the possibility of the gradual loss of traditional dances surviving in the virtual world from the perspective of digital rebirth.
Artists Revitto Cohen and Tur van Barron's Immortal (2012) and Lynn Hershman Leeson's Infinite Engine (2014) discuss the issue of physical "immortality" from different perspectives. Immortal (2012) leads the question by connecting cardiopulmonary machines, dialyzers, baby incubators, ventilators and intraoperative autologous blood transfusion machines to form fluid and air circulation to mimic biological structures. The Infinite Engine, on the other hand, is a record of science. On the exhibition wall, the audience can see the artist's list of photos of genetically engineered new species, the two screens on the table play the artist's interview with genetic researchers in a loop, and the opposite wall projects a scene taken in the laboratory. Fu said, "Artists try to make ordinary people have a certain feeling about genetic engineering research through the form of creation. In these interviews, scientists argue that genetic research is a reshaping of human society. This is also the relationship between science and art. ”
Immortal by Revito Cohen and Tur van Barron
Exhibition hall scene, Lynn Hershman Leeson's "Infinite Engine" (2014)
In addition to showing the reconstruction of people by technology, there are also many works that talk about the problem of high centralization and homogenization of the present. For example, Simon Denny's series Game of Decentralized Life attempts to explore the problem of centralized and decentralized networks, and the appearance of the work is often accompanied by a comparison of the two, such as the juxtaposition of a PC and a cryptocurrency "excavator".
Simon Danny's series The Game of Decentralized Life (2018)
Showroom scene, Harlan Farocki's "Deep Game"
Harlan Farocky's Deep Game
At the end of the showroom, the organizers placed a "football field" surrounded by artist Harlan Faroki's Deep Game (2009). It is also the only non-recent work in the exhibition hall. The work is composed of various perspectives of the 2006 World Cup final, showing the real-time and computer-generated abstract matches of both teams, showing the data behind the players' kicking, passing, catching and running. During the viewing process, the distance between fans of simulation records, movies, television, and video games is infinitely narrowed. "This digital analysis of Farocky had a very big impact on the creations of many different artists that followed, so we put these works at the end of the exhibition." ”
Rethinking technology and the virtual world from an artistic perspective
This is not the first time that Farochi's work has been exhibited at the Hao Museum. In Howe Museum's 2019 group exhibition "Serious Games," Faroki's video installation "Serious Games" shows the audience how American soldiers conduct shooting training in the streets of Afghanistan simulated by computer games. In fact, from the artist's exploration of the concept of "game" in this group exhibition, to the science fiction installation work of "Empty Mountain Base" in 2021, to the relationship between virtual and real discussed in today's group exhibition "Under the Skin, Between Machines", in recent years, Hao Art Museum has gradually focused on technology and the virtual world. "We wanted to show today's reality of the close integration of virtual and reality." Paid told reporters.
"Serious Game" exhibition site
"Empty Mountain Base" exhibition site
"The 2019 exhibition we did on video games wanted to discuss public spaces in the virtual world. What we knew about public space before was physical space, is this also possible in virtual space? Now, we are gradually paying attention to the artificial intelligence. Whether it is artificial intelligence, biotechnology, life sciences, etc. involved in the exhibition, it is relatively centralized, and it is a relatively difficult range for the audience to understand. Our perspective is from the artist's creation, showing how they see the impact of technology on today's individuals and society. Paid said.
Lin Boyan, "I Didn't Think This Was the Future," 2021
For the form of artistic expression with a "sense of technology" in the exhibition hall, Fu Said, "Form is not the most important, it is not limited to the ideas that the artist wants to present; however, the form is also very important, and the form through which to express his ideas is a challenge for the artist." "In the current large number of technology-related exhibitions, screens, computers and other equipment have become display platforms. But is that all there is to it? Probably not. In her opinion, there are installations and sculptures in this exhibition that can also show the artist's expression of the sense of science and technology.
Fu said, "People's way of thinking about programming and coding is not something that suddenly emerged today, but a way of thinking that has existed from the beginning, but after development, the most common today is in the field of computers." For example, tattoos, weaving fabrics, spider webs, can be understood from the perspective of coding. On another level, why is today's technology presented in this way? It is closely related to our human imagination of the whole society, nature, the earth, and the universe, so the corresponding technology was invented, and it has never left our inherent human imagination. Conversely, when these inherent imaginations are created as technological objects, they act on human beings themselves, but they may be accompanied by a more solidified way of thinking. So, that's why today we need to rethink the problem from an artistic point of view, looking for loose space in solidification. ”
Vee O'Reilly, 2014
"From an artistic point of view, can we imagine something more? At the same time, how to open up publicity? The curator said that these are the topics thrown out by the exhibition.
The exhibition will be on view until 24 April.