Tuesday, August 25, 2009

Swampy Openings




swampspace gallery is pleased to present:

H Y P E R C U L T U R E
an installation by Victor Muñiz

Opening Reception Saturday August 29 6-12pm

Hyperculture refers to the staggering rate of change in modern technological societies. It is the condition of perpetual interregnum. In other words hyperculture is our constant state of being between knowing and feeling while information continues to flow with increasing volume. The rampant illnesses of our society--including the disintegration of the family, the degradation of the environment, unlimited commercialism, and unrelenting stress are familiar to us all.

Victor Muñiz examines the profundity of Hyperculture according to the Gaian hypothesis that the earth is a self-regulating organism. Can the same be said of information? Does it lead a life of its own or is it merely a disposable by-product of mass culture?

In the age of information, Muñiz is a terabit of talent.

*

Also Visit the TM Sisters at Locust Projects.




"I was learning, watching people's reactions and interactions with the drawings and with me and looking at it as a phenomenon. Having this incredible feedback from people, which is one of the main things that kept me going so long, was the participation of the people that were watching me and the kinds of comments and questions and observations that were coming from every range of person you could imagine, from little kids to old ladies to art historians." Keith Haring 1984

*

2 comments:

  1. Hyperculture or as Alvin Toffler calls it "Future Shock" can also be seen to not cause change at all. At least not in the sense of a before and after. One could argue that Hyperculture or its medium Technology has more to do with the problem of covering up possible change rather than its leading to intelligible change. ...The over load of information has its autonomous reality based in what surrounds us--we are bathed in technology or information technology. There is no change in the "now" rather there is the addition of an endless supply of nows. Information is like an atmosphere or mood-like language- it's a perspectival technological medium that washes over us...its the new and improved tradition of Subject object domination.

    To start with: The etymology for word 'technology' comes from the Greek word 'techne', which leads to essentially the essence of what technology is-revealing. To the Greeks, 'techne' belonged to the general understanding of bringing-forth. Also, by adding the term Poiesis, which has a similar role to techne- they both reveal, we get a better idea as to the original meaning of early technology. The early Greek term-Poiesis (poetics) and Techne both share the temporalizing predicate of revealing which when then leads to an episteme, or an understanding of new forms of revealing...

    Somewhere along the way technology and information technology has taken on a much broader role. Rather than merely bringing forth or revealing truth, Technology took up the task of holding nature and knowledge as objects of "reserve." As has been the case especially in our time, we see technology as collapsing under the weight of its inability to sustain the supply of natural resources and we also see less and less brought forth on the information side of technology that has much to do with changing the former. It has become the age of dieting on commodified information.

    What is often a radical disclosing of humanities essence often ends up the means to an end of recuperated lifestyle. Instead of the essence of that lifestyle...words without a "Care" structure get stuck in information overload.

    Richard Haden

    ReplyDelete
  2. yes Dr Haden, the ill effect and/or benefits of technology on our psyche may be even more complicated than you so elaborately claim yet we continue to embrace advances in its development and integration on the human condition. Each successive generation takes the previous version of information management for granted but is awed by their own.

    We are old enough to know what life was like before the internet... it was kinda lame, in a good-ol way.

    ReplyDelete