reelreelreelreal

Video- and Photo Exhibition curated by Clara Wildberger
Tues - Sat / 20:00 - 22:00

Exhibition Opening / Private View & Party
20.4. - 20 Uhr

Can a future full of technological possibilities bring the solution to the crises of the present, or do they lead to more and more problems? Can we gain agency through them, or do they distract us, overwhelm us with a flood of images, and obscure our access to the world?

Science fiction brought us ideas of outer space, interplanetary travel, Star Trek, or the Star Wars - and today, some of them have come true. Technologies are fundamentally changing our lives and our world. Space is infinite, the planet a body and the sky a mirror. The image of a cloud appears sensual and light. It consists of water particles, but also of computers, metals or dirty energy: the digital is not immaterial.

Photography, for its part, is a powerful technology. It allows us to capture fleeting moments, tell stories, and change perspectives. It can show us the world in new and exciting ways, opening windows to places or events we would never have seen or experienced otherwise.

"reelreelreal" features a selection of videos by various artist:s projected onto a wall using a beamer. The use of beamers as an image presentation medium is favored because of its supposed ecological advantages. This is because projecting photos and videos is often seen as an environmentally friendly alternative to traditional displays such as televisions and monitors. This is because projectors typically consume less energy and produce less waste. Projections can be directed to a variety of surfaces that are already in place and therefore do not require additional resources such as screens or monitors. These displays are often made from materials that are energy intensive and difficult to recycle or dispose of at the end of their life. In addition, they can consume a lot of energy, especially when operated for long periods of time.

The installation at Forum Stadtpark shows a digital selection of international and local contributions that did not have to be physically transported or produced. Due to technical limitations of the projectors, the contributions are hardly visible in daylight and the installation can only be perceived in the dark. It thus also shows how ephemeral the purely digital representation is. For this reason, local artists Tolga Balcı, Yuliia Makarenko, Paola Lesslhumer, Lena Baloch, Lea Blagojević and Philipp Bohar will use the main space of Forum Stadtpark as a laboratory for their artistic practice during the exhibition period. The contributions from their work will be presented together with international works by Collectif Farata, Jing Hong Okorn Kuo and Issa Touma as a photo and video collage and can only be seen after dark. The artists were invited by Clara Wildberger and the installation was conceived by her together with Peter Hutter and Tolga Balci.

The projections include photos and videos with a political or activist background that deal with current ecological and social crises in a global context. The individual works can be understood as a call not to avert our gaze from real problems, not to let ourselves be overwhelmed by the fascination of technological innovations - but instead to actively deal with the consequences and challenges, to care about alternative solutions. It is as if we were already in the future.