Egg roll
animation stills
Egg roll
turn-tablets
Installation series. Tablet-computers, photographs, mixed media
2013, 2020, 2024
A new generation of electronic devices entered the market, as I was growing up. These gadgets are referred to as „smart“, as they are designed with a high sensory perception. More than any other consumer device before, they are aware of their surroundings. Built-in technology allows them to sense brightness, touch, noise, tilting among others, and to react to the outside circumstances accordingly.
Smart devices took over by storm, and this body of work follows that whirlwind, asking what kind of habits that technology invites. A tablet computer acts as a screen, displaying an image and representing an object. Beyond that, the image can be interacted with: turning and zooming in along the movements of our fingers, as if the displayed object really lies in our hands. A rather subtle, automated animation smoothens the movement, facilitating the core idea of animation – bringing a still image to life.
By placing the devices in a world full of objects, where their physical presence becomes an object itself, the consequences of animation are put into question. As the tablets turn, move, rotate and touch other objects and materials, their multilayered role as an interface between analog and digital, between real and representation, becomes apparent, as a technoplastic sculpture. Perhaps this is only the beginning, but I find myself intrigued by devices which act as an extension of our senses, our body and further, our perception of reality.
video
Learning from Machine Learning
Video compilation, with audio
1:40 min
2019
slideshow
Images of responsed tasks, "Select favourable Chip
designs" and "Guess chess" tasks put online
learning from machine learning
Research, video, text, generated images
2018 – ongoing
An artistic research into creative thinking as a relation between requirement and latitude in the context of both production and artificial intelligence, as well as the future of work itself.
By tasking an international workforce with unexpected and playful interventions, the project aims to make use of the new-found possibilities of a worldwide network, spanning different cultures and linking different people through technology. A form of exchange in which the social is implemented as part of the job description. In this equation, money works as a facilitator to "buy time" for the involved, perhaps to consider things like work, art and community.
When funding a group of people to hand in photographic or video material, the danger of exploitation has to be considered. Therefor, involved people were asked not to show their faces or anything that could turn against them, as the results will be exhibited. Further, the aim was to pay fair and at least above standard wages. This was hard to ensure as the workers stem from all kinds of places and use more or less time to complete a task. Judging from the fact that all tasks were picked up immediately and from conversations with some of the people, the payment was (sadly) even among the highest on the platform.
The link to A.I. is given due to the use of mturk.com, an Amazon-run website with the underlying idea to fake computing work by human labour, essentially reducing programming costs by outsourcing software tasks. The URL itself is a reference to the mechanical turk („Schachtürke“) by the hungarian inventor Wolfgang von Kempelen, a chess-playing fake robot anno 1769. In the words of Amazon, anyone can access their golbal, 24/7 on-demand workforce to offer “Human Intelligence Tasks", which are for the most part, very mondane tasks.
So far, tasks in the frame of this research required people to "select favourable Chip designs", "guess chess", "roll a plate", "show the sky from the view of your window" and things like that. Some results of the first project stage, processed by roughly 40 paid workers, were put together in a short video for the exhibition AESTHETICS OF CHANGE at the Museum für Angewandte Kunst in Vienna. The exhibition tackled utopian questions about the future of learning and working at Universities.
to be titled (studies of movement)
Video series. Duration variable
2018 – ongoing
An ever-growing video essay based on the surroundings, on spaces in which I spent a certain amount of time and made observations about the passing of such, the striding of its webs and the present, reoccuring objects.
Studio view
Installation view at das weisse haus | photo by esel.at
Installation view at das weisse haus
Studio view
image & slideshow
Fountain designs with TVs, studio and installation views during
CIRCUIT TRAINING, a cooperative exhibition project at das weisse haus, 2017
video of installation
http://www.vimeo.com/221183812
Possible fountain designs, studio view
Comparing chaotic natures such as night sky, rain and snowing of a TV
Possible fountain designs, studio view
TV fountain (Berieselung)
Installation. Water, analog TV, pump, stand.
170 x 50 x 50 cm
2017
Two celestial signals, rain and snowing, meet at the surface. Medium is all that is between, on screen. The noise displayed by the TV partly consists of the echo of the Big Bang, so they say. Rain is falling in equally chaotic manner. Water drops collide with the beam, the sum remains 0. No information, just tickling. It is unclear if they emulate or spring from each other.
Witnessing the transition from the cathode-ray tubes to flatscreen technology, a plethora of analog TV´s became obsolet in a short amount of time. This body of work is somewhat of a farewell, or the start of it, to this period of technology in time (leading up to the video THE END / TO BE CONTINUED, 2019).
Looking back, it seems ever so incredible that for almost 70 years, most people had an analog TV at their home. This device cascades up tension to several kilovolts, to produce an electron beam (and with it, other radiation) which then shoots through the vacuum tube right at you. Despite being carefully shielded, the fact that my grandparents had a deadly laser cannon in their living room is something to think about.
klangteppich (sound carpet)
Interactive installation. Carpet, contact mics, mixed media, software, speakers. 200 x 150 x 8 cm
2012
As a means of comfort, a carpet lays its imprint on a room, much the same way as the people stepping on the carpet make an imprint on it. In this work, the trustworthiness of the common ground is put into question, and into sound.
Upon entering the art space, visitors find themselves on a soft, but uneven and bumpy canvas. A frame under the carpet contains materials such as wool, wood chips, glas and stones among others. Furthermore, there are contact microphones inside, recording all the shifting and crackling. Through a matrix (Max MSP), the noises are distorted and played back to the person entering the room.
Klangteppich / Sound carpet
Installation view at HELLO MAX exhibition, Kunstraum Aarau 2012 cur. by Stephan Athanas
under the carpet: mixed media, contact mics, Max MSP, speakers
Klangteppich / Sound carpet
images & video
Installation views at exhibition LIE TO ME at Improper Walls, 2019
liquid noise
Interactive installation. Coop with Sarah Glück
Toilet, directional microphones, speaker
2019
Get a bevy, pour it in,
drip drop, bladder pop!
The location for things to flow best
is the room for rest.
Hush – no rush, gently flush and with
clean hands, before and after,
ready for real talk.
Soothing to know about every body,
the ease with their fluids are passing
just in the way that secrets do.
– – –
At first, visitors of the location are not directly informed about the fact that microphones are being installed in the toilet (...) Some activities and collateral noises are audible, their sounds are transmitted to a speaker placed inside the gallery's ventilation system.
From there, people in front of the space, visitors as well as passengers, can listen to them. As the restroom is located in the back, the unaware "actors" were not directly visible and remained anonymous - unless they actually want to reveal themselves. Over the course of an evening, people start to realise from where these familiar but strange noises derive. From then on, the stage was open.
The work is an invitation to discover, perform and interact with each other by encouraging the audience to lose the fear of their most private noises, as well as thoughts.
india
Installation. Podest, (heated) sand, hair curler, travel brochures. 45 x150 x 150 cm
2017
Several kg of sand are in an upside down podest. A hair curler heats up the sand, so much so that it feels summerly warm. Visitors can take off their shoes and stand inside. In a city like Vienna, the feeling reminds most people of southern places, of beaches and holidays, or deserts and past journeys.
A collection of old travel brochures from different parts of India, Pakistan and Nepal round out the metaphorical trip. The minimalistic and eco-friendly approach to travel manages to be just enough of a shift, to emit the feeling of being somewhere else while also turning into a representation of this state, present–but–away.
slideshow
Installation views at DIVA DAYS exhibition, curated by Christian Kobald at Gärtnergasse Vienna
