EGO

FILE 2024 | Installations
International Electronic Language Festival

The mirror stage in psychology explains how the Ego forms through objectification, where one’s visual appearance comes into conflict with emotional experience, a concept called ‘alienation‘ by psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan. The interactive installation EGO reenacts and reverses this process by distorting the mirror image based on the user’s movements, highlighting the tension between the real and the symbolic, the Ego and the It, subject and object.

Bio

Klaus Obermaier is an interdisciplinary artist, director and composer who creates innovative works in the performing arts, music and installations using new media. Stefano D’Alessio researches social issues induced by the internet and explores how the web and its derivatives influence human behavior and the body. Martina Menegon creates intricate assemblages of physical and virtual elements, exploring the contemporary self and its hybrid corporeality.

Unreal

Lawrence’s accompanying soundtrack is a delicate lattice; complex, opaque and entirely synthetic. Diva’s yearning vocals, sung in English and Mandarin, cast classical melodies over billowing, intricately arranged songs. Her voice is created with a Vocaloid voice synthesiser, giving it an uncanny feeling. Her confessional lyrics draw empathy from the listener, as she reveals her fears of becoming an irrelevant influencer, obsolete in a machine-driven age.

The lead single ‘ unreal’ is launched with a harrowing video adapted from the film.

‘SnP’, 2018, recycled plastic, injection moulded

“Widrig’s art breaks down the boundaries between disciplines; borrowing tools traditionally associated with one industry and using them in other fields, in often unanticipated and exciting ways. Widrig uses computer simulation processes and advanced technologies adopted from the special effects business to create sculptural 3D-printed craftwork—digital designs materialize into intricate sculptures in glass or recycled plastic and furniture pieces with impeccable undulated thin surfaces,” Devid Gualandris

100 Northern Ave
You’ve probably never seen anything like this before. Six members of the vertical dance troupe BANDALOOP descended the façade of the new 100 Northern Ave. building commemorating its grand opening at Boston’s Seaport District. The performers are held securely by special rigging allowing them to mesmerize audiences with dynamic physicality and intricate choreography. BANDALOOP honors nature, community, and the human spirit through perspective-bending dance. A pioneer in vertical performance, BANDALOOP seamlessly weaves dynamic physicality, intricate choreography and climbing technology to turn the dance floor on its side. Under the artistic direction of Amelia Rudolph, the work re-imagines dance, activates public spaces, and inspires wonder and imagination in audiences around the world.

Pollutive Ends
With the art installation Pollutive Ends the artist Thijs Biersteker shows the impact of 1 cigarette butt on our environment and waters. The impact is made visible by moving small elements of real polluted water hypnotically right in front of the visitors eyes through an intricate tube system. The algorithmic driven pumping system calculates the amount of visitors that are in the museum, the likelihood that they smoke and the amount of pollution that they would generate.

Kiss Me

You hold a small mirror to your nose, like a pair of glasses, while kissing someone. You look into your own eyes, but kiss someone else’s lips.
Despite the world being connected through an intricate network of fiberglass, more than ever we seem to be alone together. ‘Kiss Me’ brings these two opposing forces – unbridled narcissim on the one hand and a deep longing for connection on the other -together in one object through reinvention of an age-old instrument: the mirror.

Ad Infinitum
Ad infinitum is a parasitical entity which lives off human energy. It lives untethered and off the grid. This parasite reverses the dominant role that mankind has with respect to technologies: the parasite shifts humans from “users” to “used”. Ad infinitum co-exists in our world by parasitically attaching electrodes onto the human visitors and harvesting their kinetic energy by electrically persuading them to move their muscles. The only way a visitor can be freed is by seducing another visitor to sit on the opposite chair and take their place. Being trapped in the parasite’s cuffs means getting our muscles electrically stimulated in order to perform a cranking motion as to feed it our kinetic energy. This reminds us that, in the cusp of artificially thinking machines, we are no longer just “users”; the shock we feel in our muscles, the involuntary gesture, acknowledges our intricate relationship to uncanny technological realm around us.

geist.xyz
A synthetic ghost shifts simulated textiles from passive matter to live organisms. They behave like apparitions in an artificial choreography, with movements that are imaginary yet familiar. Like a constant metamorphosis, the same sequence gets transformed over and over again. At each step, all aspects of the designs are modified, from algorithmic pattern to color scheme to fabric behaviour. The results are meandering layers of style changes. A linear montage shows the intricate details. Shuffled layers of metronomic sounds emphasize the transformation fluctuating in and out of sync.

mandelbrot set (zooming in)

The Mandelbrot set shows more intricate detail the closer one looks or magnifies the image, usually called “zooming in”. The following example of an image sequence zooming to a selected c value gives an impression of the infinite richness of different geometrical structures and explains some of their typical rules. The magnification of the last image relative to the first one is about 1010 to 1. Relating to an ordinary monitor, it represents a section of a Mandelbrot set with a diameter of 4 million kilometers. Its border would show an astronomical number of different fractal structures.

24 drones
24 Drones is a video demonstration of the incredible drones made by Rhizomatiks and their ability to move around 3d space in ways never before seen. With intricate sensor systems both on the drones and in the room the drones are constantly checking their surroundings and mapping them in order to move without colliding with each other or a speaker who stands in the middle of the swarm of drones directing them with gestures and movements. The movement of the drones is not only controlled and safer than ever, the drones awareness of their surroundings makes them appear conscious and gives them a sense of personality.

ILANIO REUBIN AND ELENA SLIVNYAK
SUPREME BEINGS FASHION SHOW

The Supreme Beings Fashion Show will reveal the avant-garde concepts of two local fashion designers, Ilanio Reubin of Ilanio and Elena Slivnyak of IIMUAHII, at the spacious SOMArts Cultural Center on Thursday, March 1st. The two runway shows will showcase 8 imaginative looks from each designer, as well as two short improvisational performances by Butoh (contemporary Japanese) dancers which we find very fitting for the two creatives.Though different in aesthetic, both designers hail from similar backgrounds and aim for analogous goals. Ilanio (San Francisco Art Institute) and Elena (Academy of Art) both found the retail and fashion corporate worlds too constrictive and mass-produced, and thus ventured into their own imaginative ones.
Ilanio works to create “visually stunning fashion concepts that explicitly disregard wearability, saleability, and practicality; that embrace advanced definitions of sexuality and gender; and that defy the commercially-mandated boundary between the fashion and art worlds.” For Elena of IIMUAHIII, her avant-garde aesthetic is manifested in an intricately-crafted sportswear line.Although we’re dreaming of being in Paris (but really, when are we not?), we’re excited to watch Ilanio and IIMUAHII strut and represent San Francisco’s undeniable talent in their nontraditional fashion show and hope to see you all there as well!

video

ויליאם פורסיית
ウィリアム·フォーサイス
威廉‧科西
윌리엄 포사이드
УИЛЬЯМ ФОРСАЙТ
Swinging Pendulum

Suspended from automated grids, more than 400 pendulums are activated to initiate a sweeping 15 part counterpoint of tempi, spacial juxtaposition and gradients of centrifugal force which offers the spectator a constantly morphing labyrinth of significant complexity. The spectators
are free to attempt a navigation this statistically unpredictable environment, but are requested to avoid coming in contact with any of the swinging pendulums. This task, which automatically initiates and alerts the spectators innate predictive faculties, produces a lively choreography of manifold and intricate avoidance strategies.