Installation view: Tangible Remains. Hidden Matters, curated by Lena Johanna Reisner. Works pictured (left to right): Mehr Fantasie (2017-2018), Julia Varela, HD video; Europium (2014), Lisa Rave, HD video. Image copyright: DECAD, 2018.
Tangible remains. Hidden Matters explores a phenomenology of images and geology of media by means of two different artistic positions: Lisa Rave and Julia Varela develop the matter through the exploitation of media familiar to each of them.
They present at DECAD in Berlin their processof media culture. They often show virtual and augmented reality as a immaterial phenomena. On the other hand the preconditions for digital culture and mass media are permeated of physical nature with geopolitical and ecological implications.
Lisa Rave, Europium (2014), HD Video. Copyright of the artist.
Installation view: Tangible Remains. Hidden Matters, curated by Lena Johanna Reisner. Works pictured (top left to bottom right): Mehr Fantasie (2017-2018), Julia Varela, HD video; Europium (2014), Lisa Rave, HD video; Mehr Fantasie (2017-2018), Julia Varela, pulverised plasma TV screens. Image copyright: DECAD, 2018.
Julia Varela, Mehr Fantasie, 2017-2018, HD video still. Copyright of the artist.
“Europium” is a film in which the english artist Lisa Rave, born in 1979, investigates the eponymous chemical;named after a continent where deposits aren’t found. For its fluorescent features, europium is used in Euro banknotes as a proof of authenticity, and in plasma screens the material contributes to a sharper, crisper display.
Rave’s film leads the viewer to the South Pacific Ocean, namely the Bismarck Sea, where mining enterprises have identified high levels of europium. While inquiring into the technical aspects of these mining operations, Europiumreveals some part of the complex set of relations hidden in materiality of technology.
Lisa Rave, Europium (2014), HD Video. Copyright of the artist.
Julia Varela, born in 1986, pulverisesplasma on the screens: using dust as medium she alludes to questions of e-waste and calls up images of corresponding dumping grounds. The sculptural work “Mehr Fantasie” speaks through associations, referring to those toxic environments inhabitedby people outside the range of economic and environmental privilege. Once the dust settles Parikka links it to stories of deserted places but also to the temporality of matter itself andultimately, to the formation of geological strata.
‘Dust does not stay outside us but is a narrative that enters us: dust has access in every breath inhaled, and it entangles with our tissue’ (Jussi Parikka, A Geology of Media, 2015, p. 102).
Lisa Rave, Europium (2014), HD Video. Copyright of the artist.
Exhibition until December 15th
Courtesy of DECAD, Lisa Rave, Julia Varela and Lena Johanna Reisner