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Cosmopolitics

statement

Cosmopolitics: new media art from Czech republic

Czech new media art scene could be characterized by a latecomer strategy which is turning disadvantages into a source of advantage. Since video art and other 80. and 90. trends were never strong in the Czech art academies, young artists are free to experiment and often develop a very promiscuous relation to different traditions, trends and technologies.

The exhibition presents projects from recent years that demonstrate this playful and experimental strategy which serves neither purely political nor technological goals. It is cosmopolitical in a sense that it tests the limits of our common world which we share with machines and nature. It examines different networks between nature, society and technology but also between our history, present and possible futures. It presents challenging views of different hybrid collectives of humans and machines. It interconnects globalization, evolutionary and technological processes to examine different versions and views of our common world but also of the possibilities of contemporary art.

Posthuman networks
art as an exploration of the limits between physis and techné

JAKUB NEPRAŠ: GENERATOR-P730
video, 2005

Common circuit board as a media microcosm in which everyday life of a town with its inhabitants takes place between connections, cables, and hard disks.

JAKUB NEPRAŠ: LIANA
documentation, 2006

Gaia theory and the view of our planet as a living being is replaced by a giant posthuman organism in which social, natural and artificial systems come together to create a cosmic heartbeats and rhythms.
Jakub Nepraš (1981), graduated at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, studio of New Media. In 2007 won first price of Euromobil in Arte Fiera Bologna.

PAVEL STEREC: SYMBIONT
documentation, 2006

The biorobotic tree of life with special prosthesis and the new techno-paradise apple demonstrate almost an intimate relationship between the artificial and the natural.
Pavel Sterec (1985), student at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, studio of Conceptual Tendencies.
http://www.pavelsterec.info/


Global networks
art as an exploration of the new distribution channels in a world globalized by popular media

JOSEF BAREŠ: SELL DVD / MAI DVD
video, 2006
part of the XIAOZHU.org project

Instruction on how to survive as an artist in a country of pirate copies. While others sell Chinese art to make money, there is always someone who will try the more challenging thing and sell art to Chinese.
Josef Bareš (1982), degree in international business, currently a student at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, studio of New Media.
http://josef.bares.name/

MAREK WOLLMAN: NETGRAFFITI
documentation, 2007

Artists as pirates in the decentralized networks of torrents which are used for placing graffiti.
Marek Wollman (1978), graduated at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, studio of New Media.

PAVEL TICHOŇ: THE WORLD RECORD
print, 2006
part of „His Story of Communication“ project http://www.hisstory0f.com/

Guinness World Records as a new artistic medium.
Pavel Tichoň (1980), graduated at the Academy of Fine Arts, studio of Intermedia. His work is a part of a collection of young artists in the National Gallery in Prague.
http://www.ticho333.net/

Post-totalitarian networks
art as an exploration of technology, time and politics

JAN PFEIFFER: SHORT CUTS
print, 2007
Urban revolution driven by pedestrians and Google earth as a miraculous camera to our communist past.
Jan Pfeiffer.......

INTERNET GENERATION: MANIFEST 0.2
print, 2006
Main Comp
video, 2006
Art is Changing
video, 2006

Artwork is a file! Everything is a FILE! DIGITIZE everything that is analogue! SHARE all that is digital! PROGRAM and develop software for files!


ZTOHOVEN: MEDIA REALITY 17.06.2007
video, 2007

Is everything we see daily on our TV screens real? Is everything presented to us by the media, newspapers, television, Internet actually real? Hack a TV broadcast and sneak a mushroom cloud into whether report.

(by Denisa Kera and Pavel Sedlak)