smoltech - exhibition project with workshops and concerts
exhibition (works by mathr)opening Friday 26th November 2021, 7pm
artist talk Saturday 4th December 2021, 5pm
until Saturday 11th December 2021
CT20, 73 Tontine Street, Folkestone CT20 1JR, ct-20.org
workshops
Clive with mathr - Saturday 15th January 2022, 12-5pm
Improviz with Rumble‑San - Saturday 22nd January 2022, 12-5pm
IKLECTIK, "Old Paradise Yard", 20 Carlisle Lane (Royal Street corner) next to
Archbishop's Park, London SE1 7LG, iklectikartlab.com
concert with mathr, xname, rumblesan, digital selves & heavy lifting
Saurday 29th January 2022, 7-10pm
IKLECTIK, "Old Paradise Yard", 20 Carlisle Lane (Royal Street corner) next to
Archbishop's Park, London SE1 7LG, iklectikartlab.com
curatorial text
The exhibition is presented as expressing concern about techno-surveillance
capitalism and abuse of power of hyper-structures such as industrial-scale
operation data centres consuming a massive amount of electricity, and server
farms consisting of thousands of computers which require a large amount of
power to run and to keep cool. Also, crypto mining has grown exponentially in
the last few years, growing their energy consumption. In other words,
cryptocurrency mining surpasses entire countries’ energy consumption, so it
urges to spread awareness about the potential environmental costs of technology.
Furthermore, we are entering an age of mass extinction brought on by excesses
of technology resources exploitation, when obsolescence becomes a
transformative situation of the human social landscape. Economically and
ecologically, e-waste presents a massive environmental catastrophe,
transforming planetary geological eras and environments.
The exhibition proposes using technology in an ethical/ecological
applicability, searching for a lower ecological impact, representing an
alternative to Big Tech (Google, Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple). Most of
these alternatives are connected to the open- source movement and also
degrowth. Smoltech is one of these technological movements representing an
alternative to tech development, usage, and consumption. Smoltech is a movement
to reduce wasteful technology use. It promotes a long-term usage of technology,
discouraging throw away culture, preventing e-waste, and developing hacker
practices in media archaeology labs that collect old computers and tech for
their survival.
Individuals are using their newly expanded practical freedom to act and
cooperate with others in ways that improve the practised experience of
democracy, justice and development of a critical culture and community, where
collaboration and self-organisation are shared across both business and free
software / open hardware, as declared by Yochai Benkler. The degrowth movement
proposes an autonomous perspective towards capitalism and the globalised world
through artivism, care revolution and climate justice based on the
environmental movement and radical ecology democracy, proposing food
sovereignty practices that serve as a model for Technological Sovereignty. In
addition, degrowth practices apply the principles of free software movement and
the commons’ policies towards a solidarity economy and unconditional basic
income.
The exhibition consists of different works such as pure-data sound works and
different audio-visual, multimedia, and interactive installations. The artist
works using free software and develops his programs to create beautiful
fractals, digital creations and new media environments. Claude Heiland-Allen’s
(aka mathr) works show the relationship between technology and creativity using
computing to challenge conservative positions of technological corporations
because of the potential for social change that new/old media and open source
have. The audiences will gain an aesthetical experience within the exhibition
by combining computer science, performance art, music, technology, fractals,
maths, and software programming.
Curated by Laura Netz.
smoltech | netzzz.net
http://netzzz.net/smoltech/
Supported using public funding by Arts Council England.
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