© Aslan Kudrnofsky/MAK
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The exhibition ARTIFICIAL TEARS. Singularity & Humanness—A Speculation quotes from a chapter of human history yet to be written.
21.6.2017—1.10.2017
Upper Exhibition Hall
Thirteen artistic positions open hypotheses, pose questions, and provide impetus for a confrontation with the "singularity" foretold by American futurist Ray Kurzweil and being ushered in through the exponential growth of technology and highly intelligent machine interfaces.
With the proliferating possibilities for fusing science, medicine, and technology, the boldest and most terrifying visions from science fiction are being implemented in our daily lives in a manner both tangible and stealthy. The margin between animate and inanimate matter appears increasingly implausible, as does the differentiation between “real” people and their media incarnation, between “originals” and dummies.
Many of the utopian or dystopian narratives of the 20th and 21st centuries developed scenarios of societies shaped by technology as a tool for control and surveillance, their “humanness” ultimately utterly convulsed. The question arises of whether we human beings want to escape our increasing marginalization through technologies controlled by capitalist and political systems and whether we will work up the courage to fight for our freedom as a society and as individuals—in fact mainly against ourselves: When our utopias fail, we will have to unlock the potentialities in our dystopias.
“The imagination is a unique mental faculty that fuses rational and emotional faculties,” writes philosopher Ágnes Heller (Hannah Arendt Professor of Philosophy at the New School for Social Research in New York) at the opening of her essay From Utopia to Dystopia (2016). And adds, “Neither thought nor action occurs without some kind of emotion.”
ARTIFICIAL TEARS is a plea for humanity, for the resilience and variability of the human condition and the significance of remembering and forgetting.
Artists: Jean-Marie Appriou, Dora Budor, Mariechen Danz, Genghis Khan Fabrication Co., Aleksandra Domanović, Cécile B. Evans, Daiga Grantina, Matt Mullican, Sean Raspet, Sarah Schönfeld, Jeremy Shaw, Kiki Smith, Clemens von Wedemeyer
Curator: Marlies Wirth, Curator, Digital Culture and Design Collection, MAK
© Aslan Kudrnofsky/MAK
© Kiki Smith/photo: Wolfgang Woessner/MAK
© Jeremy Shaw, Courtesy of the artist and KÖNIG GALERIE, Berlin
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Supporting Program on the VIENNA BIENNALE 2017
Regular guided tours:
Overview tour – in German
Tue, 6–7 p.m., admission free, € 3,50 attendance fee
Sun, 10:30 a.m.–12 noon, MAK admission ticket + € 5 attendance fee
Overview tour – in Englisch
Sat, 2:30 p.m.–4 p.m., MAK admission ticket + € 5 attendance fee
Hello, Robot. Design between Human and Machine
Sun, 3–4 p.m., MAK admission ticket + € 3,50 attendance fee
Further tours and events at the VIENNA BIENNALE Calender at www.viennabiennale.org
Publications
VIENNA BIENNALE 2017 Guide
VIENNA BIENNALE 2017: Robots. Work. Our Future, edited by the MAK, German/English, 160 pages with numerous color illustrations, MAK Vienna/Verlag für moderne Kunst, Vienna 2017. Available at the MAK Design Shop and online at MAKdesignshop.at for € 9.80.
Hello, Robot. Design between Human and Machine
Catalog edited by Mateo Kries, Christoph Thun-Hohenstein, Amelie Klein; with contributions by Rosi Braidotti, Douglas Coupland, Anthony Dunne & Fiona Raby (Dunne & Raby), Christoph Engemann, Paul Feigelfeld, Gesche Joost, Amelie Klein, Carlo Ratti, Bruce Sterling, Marlies Wirth i.a.. Cover illustration: Christoph Niemann. Softcover, English, 328 pages, ca. 250 images, mainly in color. Available at the MAK Design Shop and online at MAKdesignshop.at for € 49,90.
Artificial Labor – e-flux
Artificial Labor is a collaboration between e-flux Architecture and the MAK, Vienna within the context of the VIENNA BIENNALE 2017: Robots. Work. Our Future.
Media
Kiki Smith, Detail of the 12-part installation Untitled, 1992/93, Mirrored glass © Kiki Smith/photo: Wolfgang Woessner/MAK
Jeremy Shaw, Video installation DMT, 2004 © Jeremy Shaw, Courtesy of the artist and KÖNIG GALERIE, Berlin