[D66] Smart New World

Oto jugg at ziggo.nl
Tue Apr 8 12:23:12 CEST 2014 

http://www.kunsthalle-düsseldorf.de/index.php?id=351

5 April -- 10 August 2014


  Smart New World

*Xavier Cha (US), Simon Denny (1982, NZ), Aleksandra Domanovic' (1981,
SI), Omer Fast (1972, IL), Christoph Faulhaber (1972, D), Kenneth
Goldsmith (1961, US), International Necronautical Society,*
*Korpys/Löffler (1966/1963, D), Trevor Paglen (1974, US), Laura Poitras
(1964, US), Tabor Robak (1986, US), Santiago Sierra (1966, ES), Taryn
Simon (1975, US)*

The truth is: Industrial capitalism is transforming itself into digital
capitalism. That changes things.[1] The world is ruled by the binary
code. The upheaval in the fields of
in­for­ma­ti­on and com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons tech­no­lo­gy
re­vo­lu­tio­nis­ed the busi­ness world and so­cie­ty.[2] What does it
me­an to be an in­di­vi­du­al in the in­for­ma­ti­on so­cie­ty? An
in­for­ma­ti­on so­cie­ty is al­ways al­so a sur­veil­lan­ce so­cie­ty.
It is not the in­for­ma­ti­on that yields the sur­veil­lan­ce, the
sur­veil­lan­ce yields the in­for­ma­ti­on: As so­on as hu­man
ut­ter­an­ces and emo­ti­ons be­co­me quan­ti­fia­ble, they are
re­cor­ded in or­der to op­ti­mi­se so­mew­he­re so­me­thing eco­no­mic,
bu­reaucra­tic or ideo­lo­gi­cal.[3] Sin­ce Ed­ward Snow­den
un­co­ver­ed the wi­de-spread sur­veil­lan­ce car­ried out the
Ame­ri­can Na­tio­nal Se­cu­ri­ty Agen­cy at the la­test, the
post-pri­va­cy thin­ker is cer­tain of one thing: The pri­va­te sphe­re
is dead, the NSA so­le­ly ma­de it of­fi­ci­al.[4] Power­ful com­pu­ters
so­me­ti­mes know mo­re about us than we do. The sto­r­a­ge
ca­pa­bi­li­ty of the­se sys­tems in­crea­ses every ye­ar,
con­sis­tent­ly, by or­ders of ma­gni­tu­de. It's get­ting to the point
whe­re you don't ha­ve to ha­ve do­ne any­thing wrong, you just
even­tual­ly ha­ve to fall un­der sus­pi­ci­on from some­bo­dy, even if
it's by a wrong call, and then they can use the sys­tem to go back in
ti­me and sc­ru­ti­ni­ze every de­ci­si­on you've ever ma­de, every
fri­end you've ever di­s­cus­sed so­me­thing wi­th, and at­tack you on
that ba­sis to sort of de­ri­ve sus­pi­ci­on from an in­no­cent li­fe
and paint an­yo­ne in the con­text of a wrong-do­er.[5] Three let­ters,
most ex­perts are agreed, will play a de­cisi­ve ro­le in the fu­ture of
mo­dern war­fa­re: NCW for Net­work Cen­tric War­fa­re. Be­hind this
de­si­gna­ti­on lie net­works that link mi­li­ta­ry units to each other
and to their com­man­ders---thus of­fe­ring them the pos­si­bi­li­ty of
ra­pid, fle­xi­ble and asym­me­tri­cal war­fa­re. The goal has be­en
un­am­bi­guous­ly for­mu­la­ted: the at­tain­ment of in­for­ma­ti­on
su­pe­rio­ri­ty over the en­e­my.[6] As a pie­ce of busi­ness jar­gon,
and even mo­re so as an in­vo­ca­ti­on of co­ming dis­rup­ti­on, the
term Big Da­ta has
quick­ly grown ti­re­so­me. But the­re is no de­ny­ing the vast
in­crea­se in the ran­ge and depth of in­for­ma­ti­on that's rou­ti­nely
cap­tu­red about how we be­ha­ve, and the new kinds of ana­ly­sis that
this enables. By one esti­ma­te, mo­re than 98 per­cent of the world's
in­for­ma­ti­on is now stored di­gi­tal­ly, and the vo­lu­me of that
da­ta has qua­dru­p­led sin­ce 2007. Or­di­na­ry peop­le at work and
at ho­me ge­ne­ra­te much of this da­ta, by sen­ding e-mails, brow­sing
the In­ter­net, using so­ci­al me­dia, wor­king on crowd-sour­ced
pro­jects, and mo­re---and in do­ing so they ha­ve un­wit­tingly hel­ped
launch a grand new so­cie­tal pro­ject. We are in the midst of a gre­at
in­fra­struc­tu­re pro­ject that in so­me ways ri­vals tho­se of the
past, from Ro­man aque­ducts to the En­ligh­ten­ment's
En­cy­clopédie.[7] The di­gi­tal re­flec­tion of to­day's per­son is
frag­men­ted in­to hund­reds of in­di­vi­du­al parts.[8] Know­ledge on
the In­ter­net is dy­na­mic. It is flee­ting. It is vo­la­ti­le. It
chan­ges its shape every day. We know litt­le about its sour­ces, the
in­te­rests stan­ding be­hind it and its re­lia­bi­li­ty.[9] The re­sult
is the grow­th of a cut, co­py and pas­te-cul­tu­re wi­thout true
ap­pro­pria­ti­on of the con­tents.[10] In­for­ma­ti­on wants to be
free. In­for­ma­ti­on al­so wants to be ex­pen­si­ve. In­for­ma­ti­on
wants to be free be­cau­se it has be­co­me so cheap to di­stri­bu­te,
co­py, and re­com­bi­ne -- too cheap to me­ter. It wants to be
ex­pen­si­ve be­cau­se it can be im­me­a­sur­a­b­ly va­luable to the
re­ci­pi­ent. That ten­si­on will not go away.[11]

 

The /Smart New World/ ex­hi­bi­ti­on fo­cu­ses on di­gi­ta­liza­t­i­on
-- the dis­so­lu­ti­on and trans­for­ma­ti­on of ana­lo­gue
in­for­ma­ti­on in­to di­gi­tal codes for the pur­po­se of sto­ring and
pro­ces­sing them -- and the ra­di­cal­ly fun­da­men­tal chan­ges it has
brought about on so­cie­ty. The in­vi­ted ar­tists not on­ly find
in­spi­ra­ti­on for their pic­to­ri­al worlds in the ra­pid de­ve­lop­ments
in the field of di­gi­tal tech­no­lo­gy, but they above all al­so
re­flect upon their cul­tu­ral, so­ci­al, and po­li­ti­cal di­men­si­ons.

Their di­ver­se pie­ces li­ke­wi­se deal per­cep­tive­ly, cri­ti­cal­ly,
and hu­mo­rous­ly wi­th the pos­si­bi­li­ties, vi­si­ons and al­so
dan­gers of di­gi­ta­liza­t­i­on. In the pro­cess, they ex­ami­ne the
ef­fects of eco­no­mic and sta­te cen­sorship, which con­sti­tu­te

an at­tack on de­mocra­tic know­ledge pro­duc­tion and the pri­va­te
sphe­re of each and every

in­di­vi­du­al, as well as the im­pact of the In­ter­net on our
struc­tu­res of thin­king and knowing. All of the works in the
ex­hi­bi­ti­on ha­ve an in­ves­ti­ga­ti­ve po­ten­ti­al in com­mon.

 

The *In­ter­na­tio­nal Necro­nau­ti­cal So­cie­ty (INS),
*a**neo-avant-gar­de,

strin­gent­ly hier­archi­cal­ly or­ga­ni­zed net­work of ar­tists,
wri­ters and phi­lo­soph­ers, has de­ve­lo­ped a com­plex ad­mis­si­on
pro­ce­du­re for the ex­hi­bi­ti­on. Every vi­si­tor must sign a
con­su­mer contract on the ba­sis of the INS's phi­lo­so­phi­cal
doc­tri­ne. Si­gning this de­cla­ra­ti­on, which is ba­sed on the
con­di­ti­ons of pre­sent-day di­gi­tal-ca­pi­ta­lism, is ab­so­lu­te­ly
re­qui­red in or­der to vi­sit the ex­hi­bi­ti­on. *Chris­toph
Faul­ha­ber's* fil­mic ar­tist bio­gra­phy tells among other things
about his un­com­for­ta­ble and pro­vo­ca­ti­ve per­for­man­ces wi­th
which he de­mons­tra­tes the me­cha­nics of sta­te-run sur­veil­lan­ce
ap­pa­ra­tu­ses whi­le it was the ar­tist duo *Kor­pys/Löff­ler*
them­sel­ves, who em­ploy­ed in­tel­li­gence-gat­he­ring me­thods in
con­junc­tion wi­th their ob­ser­va­ti­on and do­cu­men­ta­ti­on of the
Ger­man In­tel­li­gence Ser­vice's new Ber­lin head­quar­ters. The films
of *Omer Fast* and *San­tia­go Si­er­ra* ta­ke very dif­fe­rent but
equal­ly ef­fec­tive ap­proa­ches in ex­ami­ning the
di­gi­tal­ly-con­trol­led dro­ne mis­si­ons that ha­ve co­me to play a
de­fi­ning ro­le in mo­dern war­fa­re. The lar­ge­ly un­known and
in­vi­si­ble and yet hu­ge and phy­si­cal­ly tan­gi­b­le com­po­n­ents
of the Ame­ri­can mi­li­ta­ry and in­tel­li­gence ser­vices such as
buil­dings and sa­tel­li­tes are at the heart of *Tre­vor Paglen's*
com­pre­hen­si­ve­ly re­se­ar­ched works. *Lau­ra Poi­t­ras*, who along
wi­th Glenn Green­wald <http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glenn_Greenwald>
was the first per­son to ha­ve had ac­cess to the glo­bal
sur­veil­lan­ce and es­pio­na­ge do­cu­ments ma­de avail­able by Ed­ward
Snow­den <http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden>, com­bi­nes film
ma­te­ri­al do­cu­men­ting
of the NSA sur­veil­lan­ce ware­hou­se in Bluff­da­le, Utah over the
cour­se of se­ver­al ye­ars. For his part, the wri­ter *Ken­neth
Golds­mith* ta­kes the uto­pi­an po­ten­ti­al of the In­ter­net
se­rious­ly and is ac­tive on be­half of free­dom of in­for­ma­ti­on and
edu­ca­tio­nal equa­li­ty by de­cla­ring pri­va­ti­zed in­for­ma­ti­on
to be pu­blic pro­per­ty. At the sa­me ti­me he calls at­ten­ti­on to
the sheer
in­ex­haus­ti­ble flood of di­gi­tal da­ta that is vir­tual­ly
im­pos­si­ble to get un­der con­trol. The ar­tist *Ta­ryn Si­mon* in
turn sub­jects the flood of In­ter­net ima­ges to a con­cep­tu­al
in­ter­ven­ti­on which cle­ar­ly shows that se­arch en­gi­nes are ne­ver
"neu­tral" and that they de­ter­mi­ne our ima­gi­na­ti­on to a
con­s­i­dera­ble extent. *Aleksan­dra Do­ma­no­vic'* li­ke­wi­se
re­veals how the key­word-ba­sed
ac­qui­si­ti­on of know­ledge in­flu­en­ces our thought and
per­cep­ti­on, and in a per­for­mance ac­com­pa­ny­ing the
ex­hi­bi­ti­on *Xa­vier Cha* trans­la­tes the of­ten com­pul­si­ve use
of di­gi­tal me­dia in­to a cho­reo­gra­phy. *Ta­bor Ro­bak* pres­ents
ad­ver­ti­sing's se­duc­tive stra­te­gies by me­ans of the
pos­si­bi­li­ties of di­gi­tal ima­ging. *Si­mon Den­ny*, fi­nal­ly,
turns hard­ware in­to sculp­tu­re in his cont­ri­bu­ti­on to the
ex­hi­bi­ti­on, broaching the the­me of the si­gni­fi­can­ce of
tech­ni­cal de­ve­lop­ment, com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons and in­ter­face. His
mas­si­ve block of squas­hed te­le­vi­si­on sets and ana­lo­gue
te­le­vi­si­on ima­ges on prin­ted can­va­ses crea­te a link bo­th
vi­sual­ly and con­ten­tual­ly to the ex­pan­si­ve black box in the
entran­ce area in which the INS ar­chi­ves the vi­si­tors' si­gna­tu­res
it collec­ted: This black box is part of a sys­tem that on­ly makes
com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons and the trans­fer of in­for­ma­ti­on pos­si­ble via
the in­ter­face, wi­thout ma­king the in­ter­nal pro­ces­ses vi­si­ble.

 

[1] <http://www.kunsthalle-d%C3%BCsseldorf.de/#_ftnref1> www.
spiegel.de/spiegel/print/d-14838490.html
<http://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/print/d-14838490.html> / /

[2] <http://www.kunsthalle-d%C3%BCsseldorf.de/#_ftnref2> http://
www.fes.de/aktuell/documents%202013/ 130215_Digitaler_Kapitalismus.pdf
<http://www.fes.de/aktuell/documents%202013/130215_Digitaler_Kapitalismus.pdf> 


[3] <http://www.kunsthalle-d%C3%BCsseldorf.de/#_ftnref3> http://
irights.info/
eine-informationsgesellschaft-ist-immer-eine-uberwachungsgesellschaft
<http://irights.info/eine-informationsgesellschaft-ist-immer-eine-uberwachungsgesellschaft>


[4] <http://www.kunsthalle-d%C3%BCsseldorf.de/#_ftnref4> http://
www.tagesanzeiger.ch/leben/gesellschaft/
Die-PostPrivacyBewegung/story/18211611? track
<http://www.tagesanzeiger.ch/leben/gesellschaft/Die-PostPrivacyBewegung/story/18211611?track>


[5] <http://www.kunsthalle-d%C3%BCsseldorf.de/#_ftnref5>
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/06/top-spying-experts-even-good-people-should-oppose-spying-because-if-someone-in-government-takes-a-dislike-to-you-the-surveillance-can-be-used-to-frame-you.html


[6] <http://www.kunsthalle-d%C3%BCsseldorf.de/#_ftnref6>
http://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/armeen-der-zukunft-technologien-und-taktik-fuer-den-krieg-von-morgen-a-846443.html


[7] <http://www.kunsthalle-d%C3%BCsseldorf.de/#_ftnref7>
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/12/theyre-watching-you-at-work/354681/


[8] <http://www.kunsthalle-d%C3%BCsseldorf.de/#_ftnref8>
http://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/web/identitaet-im-netz-das-digitale-ich-liegt-in-scherben-a-567899.html


[9] <http://www.kunsthalle-d%C3%BCsseldorf.de/#_ftnref9>
http://www.julius-leber-forum.de/projekte/digitale-oeffentlichkeit/2012/06-wissen-der-welt.html?np_all=1


[10] <http://www.kunsthalle-d%C3%BCsseldorf.de/#_ftnref10>
http://www.zeit.de/studium/hochschule/2011-05/lehre-google

[11] <http://www.kunsthalle-d%C3%BCsseldorf.de/#_ftnref11>
http://www.librarianoffortune.com/librarian_of_fortune/2011/08/information-wants-to-be-free-or-expensive.html


[last accessed: 4 March 2014]

 

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