In the era of new technologies and the exploration of Mars, how do contemporary artists view, appropriate, interrogate the cosmos? Has the development and accessibility of certain data, initiated new artistic practices, new fantasies, new “alien” encounters? These are the questions that the exhibition’s Cosmos: 2019 would like to ask.
With : Susan Hiller, Cécile Beau, Venzha Christ, Guillaume Bertrand, les Éditions à Mort, David Guez, Jingfang Hao & Lingjie Wang, Esther Hunziker, Marie Lienhard, Silvi Simon, RYBN.ORG.
During the 1960s at the time of the Cold War, Space was an issue of national prestige, power and rivalry between the United States and the U.S.S.R. In reaction to the U.S.S.R. sending the first man into space (1961), the United States, sent the first man to the Moon. So, on July 20 1969, during the Apollo XI mission, man took his first step on the moon.
This historical event was broadcast globally, live via satellite, over television and radio, and reached an audience of more than 500 million people on this Blue Planet. A landmark event in media history, these images sparked a fertile imagination of space travel, confirming the aesthetic intuition of Stanley Kubrik’s film 2001 : A Space Odyssey, which had been released one year earlier. Where fiction anticipates reality…
Fifty years later, space became less about national conquest, more about scientific research and technological development with international collaborations like the International Space Station. Their images inundate the Internet and are quite accessible to all.
In the era of new technologies and the exploration of Mars, how do contemporary artists view, appropriate, interrogate the cosmos ? Has the development and accessibility of certain data, initiated new artistic practices, new fantasies, new “alien” encounters? These are the questions that the exhibition’s Cosmos: 2019 would like to ask.
Cosmos: 2019 is introduced by two codes: first, ‘Binary Stele’ by David Guez, which imprints the binary code of the iconic photo of man’s first steps on the moon onto material, thus retaining this image for eternity, second, an installation by Guillaume Bertrand, of the navigation software for the Apollo XI program, remembers Margaret Hamilton, the woman who created this software yet remained unknown for forty-seven years and because of whom, men were able to walk on the Moon.
The art works presented in the exhibition Cosmos: 2019 propose another journey in space: in the literal sense by experiencing flight with Logics of Gold by Marie Lienhard, and also by discovering the poetic and fictitious galaxies of Cécile Beau, solar and martian traces of Jinfang Hao and Lingjie Wang, Ester Hunziker and Silvi Simon. Cosmos: 2019 is also an opportunity to meet those who observed unidentified flying objects in the sky through the installation of Susan Hiller, the pop up book of Editions à Mort which gives a voice to ufologists. And, with the researches of Venzha Christ and RYBN.ORG to ask whether the cosmos might now be a new territory for intervention by artists.
Cosmos: 2019 towards another space conquest?
Opening on Saturday 13th October at 5 p.m in Espace multimédia Gantner
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