Installation view, "Unnatural Encounters", Galerie Herold, Bremen. © Luiz Zanotello, 2018

The Burst

Artwork

Title: Copper Litanies (2018)
Format: mixed-media installation, 1 x 0.5 x 2.5m
Materials: copper, water, heater element, pump, glass, electronic parts

Short Description

The installation gradually reveals the inner litanies of an object central to contemporary technology: copper. It was created as part of a larger investigation into a possible singularity event, when techno-automated intelligence and its material realities may come into friction and burst in unison. Through a series of experiments, moments of intense friction between raw copper (matter) and digital information (abstraction) are accelerated to shed light on the impending burst.

The technical object in its most contemporary form relies on the discretization and standardization of matter to perform ever more intense and uniform operations. How is it that in order for such objects to come into existence, matter must be tamed, its processes obscured, and its rawness broken down into discrete pieces? While we encounter these objects in their industrialized, sharp, black-boxed formats, the materials from which they are constructed may, at their core, contain intricate histories and agendas beyond their superficial appearance. What are the states in which serialized matter becomes discursively multiple again?

Acknowledgments

Research supported by the Speculative Design residency program (Goethe-Institut, KIKK Festival, and Abattoirs de Bomel) and the Graphic Art Colony for Youth residency program (Ministry of Culture of Serbia and HfK Bremen).

Time-lapse, installation detail. © Luiz Zanotello, 2018

Installation detail. © Luiz Zanotello, 2018