Online platform upstream.gallery proudly presents its third exhibition
Echo
Curator: Jan Robert Leegte
“A show about our awkwardness, aches and astonishment with our mediated selves. Do our avatars share our dreams at night?”
Participating artists:
LaTurbo Avedon, Petra Cortright, Harm van den Dorpel, Miron Galić, Yael Kanarek, Jan Robert Leegte, Cassie McQuater, Martine Neddam, Marisa Olson, Jonathan Puckey, Sabrina Ratté, Taniguchi Akihiko and Damon Zucconi
Opening, Friday May 22nd, 17.00 (CEST)
Location: http://www.upstream.gallery
“It’s like being in an aquarium” - Josephine Bosma mentioned during a Jitsi gallery opening, observing 20 people side by side looking at each other, not knowing what to say in this precarious but novel condition. The Lockdown has accelerated our forced embrace with our mediated selves. Headaches, loss of focus, but also experimentation, resulting in new and exciting ways of communicating.
Our history with computers is also a history of our real-time representation within computers. It being an interactive medium, the machine needs our presence in some way; a mouse pointer, the typing of letters in a text field, a voice, moving avatar or video stream. But how deeply related we are with our representation, it operates in a different realm. The mirror or echo of our actions has a flavor of its own. This dissociation brings in a digital weird that becomes a new space.
This exhibition showcases works from 1998 to 2020, that all navigate this space, reflecting on how our disembodied selves echo back their unique presence.
(image from "Jennifer's Quest" by Cassie McQuater)
In spring 2020 Upstream and Constant Dullaart made plans to develop a new online platform. Joining forces with Jan Robert Leegte, Jonas Lund and Ties van Asseldonk & Deborah Mora of Interaction Design Artez the idea became upstream.gallery an online platform meant for exhibitions developed, curated and participated by artists and curators that belong to the top of the digital art world. This new exhibition, curated by Jan Robert Leegte is the 3rd show on the platform.