XIX. Crits

Beatrice Gibson — Crone Music: Camden art center
Another of those encounters which remind us of the urgency to deconstruct hegemonic social structures by mean of ambivalent yet joyful observations. Beatrice Gibson, through her de-figuration of motherhood influenced by the works of poets like CoConrad and Eileen Myles, takes her audience through the intensity of what it means to be mother in the current epoch. Diverging from current theoretical trend of non-mothering as feminist emancipation, she makes explicit the ambivalence of being mother of, being mother to, an unset you, an unknown other. Simultaneously, she deconstructs the image of the mother as an untamed character echoing the complexity of social expectations. (A very intense moment I recall is the contrast between what seems to be a panic attack, at the opening “I hope I am loud when I am dead”, and its end scene she phrenetically dances with her son.

Arebyte — RE-FIGURE-GROUND
Sadly this group show failed at fulfilling the naive expectations I had whereas reading the promising description of the show. As stated, it was about reoccurring teams of cyber-reconfiguration by means of hybridisation, encounter with the abject, some forms of alien phenomenology and a certain optimistic understanding of cyberspace as a protected zone for uncanny feminist encounters. In reality it turned out to be another of those show re-enacting the too present aestheticisation of such discourses by mean of VR shiny uterus-caves rendered through Unity and Unreal engine together with video assemblages compiling sad-socialist pseudo-poetic writings (often with poor literacy qualities) and a self-pitying tendency from privileged young artist’s struggle to cope with life. Beyond my hush criticism, I do think there is an issue in those black box aesthetic tendencies which I believe cast shadows on the real contingency of cyberspace and VR space as a new context for honest feminist praxis. It seems to be time that we escape our shinny mirrors toward a more tender acknowledgement of inclusive visual languages transcending slick renders of nothing-ness and empty echo-chambers discourses.

Beaubourg Paris — Printing the living
Very informative thus interesting exhibition about synthetic material state of the art and the way they are currently applied within art and design. Nothing much to be said about the exhibition in itself unless that it is well unpacked thus the actual applications showcased are not of considerable relevance (so many chairs and lamps and 3D printed things). I’ll just drop a few materials, studio and artists names as a reminder form myself. Miscelium // Isaac Monté - Bacon plastic // Bio-impression // Catt & Zurr — Semi-living worry dolls // Wetware — Rudy Rucker // Eduardo Kac // Algaculture — Burton Nitta // L - systems // Pamela rosenkranz artist // textile prevalence in new materialities // I have trouble with the exploitation of the non-human for the sake of bio-tech demonstration // physarum polycephalum <3 // Eros & Thatanos in the semi-human vase project by Hongjie Yang