On the occasion of the 16th anniversary of MODEM Centre for Modern and Contemporary Art, the exhibition New Mediations opened on 1st October. The exhibition aims to showcase the work of a current international art trend, the online and contemporary art community of Generation Y artists from the UK, Germany, Serbia, and Hungary, independent of geographical boundaries.
Is there an internet aesthetic? What does material mean in virtual reality? What is the crossover between digital and analogue? What is the relationship between ubiquity and ubiquitous transmission? How do the roles of consumer, mediator, and creator merge?
Before visiting an exhibition, we look at installation photos or artists’ works on our smartphones, continuing and maintaining the continuous cycle of images and their contents. The reproduction of artworks and exhibitions in the digital space goes further than they could ever go with their physical presence.
The technological development of the Internet has intensified the mediation of images to an unprecedented level, where we are mediators, consumers, and (re)creators of images and content. In this new process of mediation, we, the viewers, the content sharers, and the creators, become both recipients and producers in a constant circulation of images. This media-historical change has left a decisive mark on our culture, replacing the rigidity of materials with a series of flexible interactions, as a result of which our actions can be understood as new forms of mediation.
The exhibition aims to present the work of a current international art trend, an online and contemporary art community of Generation Y artists from the UK, Germany, Serbia, and Hungary, independent of geographical boundaries. Strongly connected to both the material and virtual universe, Generation Y, or millennials, have literally grown into the world of the internet and social media, which has brought about significant changes in their perception of the world.
They work in a variety of genres, using predominantly analogue techniques, but at the same time, they seek their reference network in the aesthetics of the Internet, in the virtual reality that underlies their everyday existence. Their paintings, objects, and sculptures are meticulously designed and crafted using both digital and hand tools. Many of them reveal the process of creation on the surface of their works, leaving behind subtle, personal traces. Others play with the flaws in their work or create unusual parallels between images.
A new international exhibition at the MODEM Centre for Modern and Contemporary Art offers an insight into the diverse, personal exploration of the Internet aesthetic through the work of twelve contemporary artists and a group of four artists, creating new images and forms that break free from the rigidity of materials, giving further space to the mediation of the real and the virtual.
Exhibiting artists:
Róbert Batykó, Arno Beck, Birds of Cool (Márton Gresa, Dániel Kármán, László Németh [Laca], Levente Radvánszki), Maja Djordjevic, Hannah Sophie Dunkelberg, Oli Epp, Liam Fallon, Tim Freiwald, Christian Holze, Botond Keresztesi, Márton Nemes, Harrison Pearce, Aaron Scheer
Curator:
Krisztián Gábor Török
Graphic design:
Melinda Sassné Döme
