peer to space’s curator Peggy Schoenegge at WISE 2020

peer to space’s curator and project manager Peggy Schoenegge moderated a panel with Patricia Detmering (Artist), Giorgio Vitale (Director Synthesis Gallery) and Li Zhenhua (Curator, Artists and Producer) on VR Art in China and the West for WISE 2020.

The talk will be streamed on August 29, 2020, 2:55 to 3:40 pm, CET Berlin.

WISE is a Future Think Tank. It is China’s most important global summit connecting thought leaders of the creative industries, science and the tech community on both sides of the Great Firewall to discuss essential questions about how we want and should live in the future.

 Further Information

HOME IS WHERE HEART IS - New Iteration of PARS PRO TOTO

Home Is Where Heart Is

(Online from July 1 until September 30, 2020)

Works by Stephanie Comilang, Sarah Iris Mang, Rosalia Namsai Engchuan

Rosalia Namsai Engchuan, Complicated Happiness, video, still, 2020

Curated by Gloria Aino Grzywatz

The second iteration of Pars Pro Toto considers home in the age of globalized migration. The stories told by the artists Stephanie Comilang, Rosalia Namsai Engchuan and Sarah Iris Mang disclose different motivations for leaving their countries and handling living abroad. Some are migrant laborers, leaving behind their families for seven to ten months. Some must find a new home far away. Some are challenging the stereotypes of their migrant background. They all speak about the repercussions on their own identity and on the feeling of home. Hoping for better living conditions abroad, humans are often times stranded in intermediate worlds, unable to move forward or backward. In their thoughts and feelings, home exists as a place of longing and security. Home becomes the utopia of a better life carried in your heart. Home Is Where Heart Is shows that feeling home need not be coupled to one place and how living abroad can affect individual lives.

peertospace.eu/parsprototo

Tina Sauerlaender appointed Artistic Director of VR ART PRIZE

Tina Sauerlaender, Photo by J. Pegman, 2020

Peer to space’s Co-Founder, Director and Head Curator was appointed Artistic Director of the VR ART PRIZE by DKB in Cooperation with CAA Berlin. The VR ART PRIZE  is the first art prize for virtual reality in the field of visual arts with an institutional exhibition in Germany and aims to contribute to the structural establishment of this emerging medium in art. The prize focuses on exploring the artistic potential of new technologies, seeking to explore and critically reflect on how they impact on individuals and society. The prize aims to contribute to the structural establishment of this emerging medium in art.

The Open Call for VR artists is open until June 30, 2020.

vrkunst.dkb.de

New Online Screening Series PARS PRO TOTO by peer to space

Ora Ruven, Home Of, 2020, (video still), (c) the artist

Pars Pro Toto is peer to space’s online series showcasing video art works which focus on very personal stories narrated by the artist or by the protagonist. The works are embedded in a thematic context of cultural, social, political, or environmental issues. A new iteration focusing on a further topic will be released bimonthly. 

Pars Pro Toto creates a digital space for users to be silent observers and to simultaneously witness the social complexity of the world. By discovering artworks based on individual experiences yet presented in a broader context, the series demonstrates how the personal symbolizes a part of the whole, a pars pro toto. The personal story seen as an extract of an overall reality becomes visible and fits into the mosaic of the collective experience. Exploring larger issues through the individual lens activates awareness within the viewers. This leads to a deeper and more empathetic understanding of today’s global social conditions. The series promotes the importance of freedom of expression and the necessity of providing a voice for everyone as a basis for a caring and participatory society. 

The first iteration of Pars Pro Toto, THE PERSONAL IS POLITICAL, curated by Gloria Aino Grzywatz and Tina Sauerlaender deals with the political and social conditions impacting individual lives. The stories told by artists Christa Joo Hyun D’Angelo, Lizza May David & Claudia Liebelt, JR and Ora Ruven consider the influence of the power of the state authorities, of war, exclusion, of discrimination of minorities. They reveal arbitrary political decisions and who is seen and who is not. Their stories take place in different places at different times, yet they show how the reciprocity of personal conditions and an individuals’ values inherited through the system in which they were born affect their path in  life. The rallying cry “The Personal Is Political” echoes in their works as well as the overall motto of the screening series, Pars Pro Toto. It was used as a slogan during the student movement and second wave feminism in the 1960s, which is why this screening especially highlights stories of women. THE PERSONAL IS POLITICAL is online from May 1 until June 30, 2020

Visit the first iteration of PARS PRO TOTO - THE PERSONAL IS POLITICAL - here.

Laval Virtual Conference - Panel on Digital and Virtual Art Exhibitions IRL and the Virtual World

Panel at Laval Virtual Conference:
Digital and Virtual Art Exhibitions IRL and the Virtual World

April 23, 2020 at 4-6 pm Berlin time / 10 am -12 pm New York time
At: Laval Virtual Conference (at Laval Virtual World)

Short Talks by
Michael Connor (Artistic Director, rhizome.org)
Christiane Paul (Adjunct Curator of Digital Art | Director/Chief Curator Whitney Museum | Sheila C. Johnson Design Center, The New School)
Alfredo Salazar-Caro (Co-founder DiMoDA)
Tina Sauerlaender (Co-founder peer to space and Radiance VR)
Panel Discussion moderated by
Julie Walsh (Founder Walsh Projects)

How to join the conference?
The participation is for free.
Register for the conference
Download and install the Laval Virtual World (you can use it on your desktop)
Login and explore the world.
Read guidelines how to attend the conferences
The full schedule of the events can be found here.

WALKTHROUGHS by Synthesis Gallery: Martina Menegon and Tina Sauerlaender

WALKTHROUGHS by Synthesis Gallery
April 20 at 6 pm Berlin time / Noon New York time
Live Streaming on Facebook here
ZOOM Link here
 

Martina Menegon will introduce her VR works and be in conversation with peer to space’s Director Tina Sauerlaender. They will speak about the perception of self and the creation of identity in the digital world. The talk will be moderated by George Vitale (Synthesis Gallery).

About the series Walkthroughs : VR art live streamed through the artist's eyes. A weekly meetup happening online with curators joining the conversation and creatives that, in turn, put the headset on, share their screen and walk us through the VR work. The walkthroughs focus on providing an overview of the artist’s creative process and insights into the work as heard from the artists themselves, as they walk us through it.

Image: Martina Menegon, ‘when you are close to me I shiver’, VR experience, still, 2020

Synthesis Gallery
Martina Menegon

Group Show Colliding Humans On How We Communicate Online

COLLIDING HUMANS. Social Interaction on the Internet

Artists: Jonas Blume, Manja Ebert, Aron Lesnik, Lauren Moffatt

Curated by Tina Sauerlaender and Peggy Schoenegge (peer to space)

Organized by medienkunst e.V. – Verein für zeitgenössische Kunst mit neuen Medien

Opening: September 27, 2019, 7 pm  

Duration: September 28 to October 6, 2019

Artist Talk: October 2, 2019, 7 pm

(With the curator Peggy Schoenegge and the artists Jonas Blume, Manja Ebert and Aron Lesnik)

At: Raum für drastische Maßnahmen, Oderstraße 34, 10247 Berlin, Germany

"Good relationships make us happier and healthier." That is the conclusion of two Harvard studies that spent 75 years researching with over 600 people what makes people really happy. But what happens to our relationships when we communicate mostly over the Internet?

Online communication bridges physical distances and connects us. We can easily send messages across continents and get an answer within a few seconds. However, the physical vis-à-vis is missing. The other's body, facial expressions and gestures are no longer part of interpersonal exchange. We are alone with the screen while interacting socially. Like a mirror, the screen echoes us back at ourselves. We share our space only with our own view of the world, while that of others remains out of sight. This one-sided perception can lead to a loss of empathy and—in the end—to disrespectful, hateful comments. As soon as we publish personal information on the Internet, we are exposed to the scrutiny of others, and on the other hand we are free to scrutinize in return.  

Read the full text here.

The participating artists are members of medienkunst e.V.

In cooperation with Raum für drastische Maßnahmen and medienkunst e.V.

Image credits: Lauren Moffatt, The Tulpamancer, 2019, immersive video installation (detail) // Jonas Blume, Rhythm Zero Los Santos, 2019, video still // Aron Lesnik, ISOLATION, 2018, video still // Manja Ebert, sleepingsquad, 2016, video sculpture // All images © the artists

RADIOSANDS - exhibition curated by Tina Sauerlaender

RADIOSANDS - Installation by Thom Kubli

August 23 - September 1, 2019 at Haus am Lützowplatz, Berlin

We live in a filter bubble online. Algorithms sort through the daily flood of information so that we can select fragments to build our reality. Just as grains of sand, we assemble the pieces until they make sense as a whole. The installation Radiosands reflects the generation, distribution and perception of information in the digital age.

Thom Kubli, Radiosands, HeK Basel, 2019, Image © Aya Imamura

Radiosands is comprised of sixteen identical radios specifically designed for the installation. They float upon delicate pedestals as if on radio waves through the space. The audio fragments emitted from the radios are based on search results algorithms found in analog FM radio frequencies in the area. The search terms were predefined by the artist. They refer to political entities, emotions as well as perception and reflect life in today’s society. Like Facebook’s algorithms, they select information to be heard on the radios in real time. Audio excerpts from various broadcasts come together simultaneously in the exhibition and create a spatial installation of sound. Sentence fragments from different sources form new meanings together. The installations of Radiosands are always site-specific, because the events taking place in the surroundings are transmitted via radio into the exhibition space.

Radio or Internet—despite the medium, all information is repetitively filtered until the receivers perceive it. The starting point is the intention of the senders, who decide on the content, formulation and channel. The selection of the medium, its range and distribution determine how visible the information will be to specific groups. The recipients’ selective perception and cultural imprint makes them more open to some information than to others. Out of the fragments they receive, they generate a meaningful narration of our reality.

How many building blocks do we actually need to make our reality convincing? And how truthful is it? These questions are reminiscent of world building in science fiction and fantasy literature. It describes the construction of an imaginary, holistic cosmos with many single components necessary for a consistent, credible world. The end product is what the artist Thom Kubli calls “granular reality.” In novels as in reality, it is important that we embed these small pieces of information in a narrative both coherent and consistent to make it ring true. We may then forget the single parts and see only the big picture, like sand on the beach. 

The exhibition Radiosands at the Haus am Lützowplatz is curated by Tina Sauerlaender (peer to space).
The project is a collaboration between Thom Kubli with the research team of Dr. Sven Hirsch the Institute for Applied Simulation at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences.

Artistic Idea, Composition: Thom Kubli
Research Direction ZHAW: Dr. Sven Hirsch
Computer Language: Dr. Manuel Gil, Dr. Martin Schüle
Audio analysis: Prof. Dr. Thilo Stadelmann, Daniel Wassmer, Tobias Schlatter
Programming: Lydia Ickler, Norman Juchler
Technology and mechatronics: Florian Guist, Marek Olkusz
Assistant: Christian Maximilian Blasius

 With the helpful support of:  Hauptstadtkulturfonds Berlin, Ernst Göhner Stiftung, Hasler Stiftung, Migros Kulturprozent, ZHAW (Zurich University of Applied Sciences), HeK Basel and Haus am Lützowplatz.

Special thanks to Speechmatics for making the Speech Recognition Engine available.

Peer to space’s Director Tina Sauerlaender at VRHAM 2019

June 9, 2019, at 6 pm at Stockmeyerstrasse 43, Hamburg HafenCity, Oberhafenquartier, Germany

peer to space’s director Tina Sauerlaender moderates a panel with Gabrielle Roque (Director COCOTTE-MINUTE, winner of the international Residency VRHAM! 2019), Ulrich Schrauth (Artistic Director VRHAM! Virtual Reality & Arts Festival) and Julie Walsh (freelance curator for VR & AR, founder of Walsh Projects) on exhibiting VR Art in a physical space.

VRHAM! is an international Festival for Virtual Reality Art. Established in 2018, the festival opens its doors for the second time, from 7 to 15 June 2019, in Hamburg’s Oberhafenquartier. Under this year’s motto “DIS:SOLUTION” they present a large selection of Virtual Reality experiences and live performances by contemporary artists. 

Further Information

VR art exhibition on Speculative Species at Espronceda, Barcelona

SPECULATIVE SPECIES - VR Art in the Age of the Anthropocene

Artists: Bianca Kennedy & The Swan Collective (DE), Juan Le Parc (ARG/FR), Jakob Kudsk Steensen (DK/US), Lara Torrance (UK/US)

Curators: Tina Sauerlaender & Peggy Schoenegge (DE) and Erandy Vergara (MX/CAN)

At: Espronceda, Center for Art & Culture, Carrer D'Espronceda 326 Nave 4,5 & 10
08027 Barcelona, Spain

Opening & Artist Talk & Panel Discussion: June 20, 2019, 7 pm

Duration: June 20 to 29, 2019

In the course of industrialisation, urbanisation and technolisation, human’s impact on the environment is increasing. The use and destruction of nature and its resources impairs the ecosystem, causing damage such as the hole in the ozone layer, climate change, the endangerment and extinction of various species. New procedures make it even possible to change DNA, which equally affects the whole system. All these human interventions inevitably affect global ecology and its creatures. Mankind has never been perceived as such an influencing factor for the environment. Today’s scientists and thinkers propose a new epoch, the Anthropocene, that describes and deals with the man-made changes, speaking from a geology of humankind.

Art as a mirror of current affairs also deals with these issues and uses new technologies such as VR. Using the possibilities of the virtual space as a room for experiments, artists reflect and speculate on characteristics and future developments of this new era of human interference with the environment and its creatures. They ask about the development of flora and fauna and how living conditions of different terrestrial species change. What kind of interrelation between humans and their environment will occur? The artists engage with the interconnections between humans and their fellow living creatures today and in speculative futuristic settings. This discussion/debate/speculative approach is transferred into the virtual space, in which the visitor immerses into.

Bianca Kennedy and The Swan Collective propose insects as alternative nutrition causing future genetic modifications. Juan Le Parc reveals an ancient temple built with meat products as a theatrical animal tragedy to discuss the duality of mass consumption and religious symbolism. With RE-ANIMATED Jakob Kudsk Steensen resurrects an extinct bird from recordings of its mating call in a world inhabited by algorithmically grown digital plants. Lara Torrance draws attention to endangered species in New England by placing their glassy versions into the virtual space.

Invited by the Goethe-Institut and Studio XX in Montréal, Erandy Vergara and Tina Sauerlaender developed the concept of their exhibition series Critical Approaches in Virtual Reality Art where this exhibition is part of. This series combines the passion and expertise of two curators: Erandy Vergara's engagement with postcolonial and feminist perspectives on media art and theory (Mexico/Montreal) and Tina Sauerlaender's curatorial engagement with digital technologies and Virtual Reality (Berlin). Together with peer to space’s curator Peggy Schoenegge, they curate the exhibition SPECULATIVE SPECIES.

Image: Jakob Kudsk Steensen, Re-Animated, 2018, screenshot of VR experience © the artist

Artist Talk with THIS IS FAKE moderated by peer to space's curator Peggy Schoenegge

As part of the group exhibition UNSTABLE SETTINGS, peer to space’s curator Peggy Schoenegge will moderate an artist talk with the artist collective THIS IS FAKE. In addition to their new works, the focus will be on virtual reality as an artistic medium and social dynamics in the digital age.

Date: Friday May 5, 2019 at 4 - 6 pm

Venue: UNTERGESCHOSS14 of Halle14 at the Leipziger Baumwollspinnerei, Spinnereistraße 7, 04179 Leipzig

More information

Technobodies: Pecha Kucha Art Night 5 / Post-Digital

Pecha Kucha Art Night 5 //Post-Digital takes place as a part of the Technobodies event series:

CUBE, Virtual Gallery for Virtual Art, Architectural Design by Manuel Rossner, Courtesy of Roehrs & BoetschDate: May 23, 2019, 6 pm (doors open)

Date: May 23, 2019, 6 pm (doors open)

Location: Grüner Salon, Volksbühne, Berlin

Tickets on Eventbrite // Event on Facebook

In the digital age, the digital is no longer only digital. Digital aesthetics entered real space long ago, and new technologies such as Virtual Reality or Augmented Reality are producing new art forms. Curating takes place on and offline, in exhibition spaces, websites or on social media. Art is now even sold over Instagram. Museums use digital tools to promote their exhibitions. Art and life are now increasingly intertwined outside of the museum and the White Cube.

The evening’s speakers will introduce their various subject areas and thereby will sketch an exciting picture of the post-digital art scene in Berlin. The talks will be given in English or German.

Speakers:

Antje Akkermann, Curator of Media, Ethnological Museum and Museum of Asian Art in the Humboldt Forum

Alma Alloro, Artist

Tilman Baumgärtel, Author, journalist, professor for Media Science, University of Applied Sciences, Mainz

Philip Hausmeier, Co-founder, RadianceVR.co

Janne Nora Kummer, Director, performer, multimedia artist, member of the artist collective virtuellestheater

Wolf Lieser, Director, DAM

Peggy Schoenegge, Board member, medienkunstverein.com

Anika Meier, Art scholar, author, curator

Daniel Neugebauer, Head of Department of Communications and Cultural Education, HKW

Nina Roehrs, Director, Roehrs & Boetsch

Manuel Rossner, Artist and founder of Float Gallery

Sakrowski, Curator, panke.gallery and member of 21cc

Since 2015 the lecture series PECHA KUCHA ART NIGHT has been organized and moderated by Tina Sauerlaender (peer to space) and Yvonne Zindel (Performing Encounters).

More information about the event.
More information about the previous PECHA KUCHA ART NIGHTS.

Technobodies is curated by Yvonne Zindel, who explores the possibilities of the digital in art and design, cultural hacks, and digital forms of mediation in a research-based and artistic way. Since 2014 she has regularly been negotiating topics such as AI and hacking in her series Performing Encounters. The series addresses scenarios for the exchange and genesis of ideas at the interface of art and science, in the intimate yet public setting of the Grüner Salon. The interplay between data and our bodies will be explored. In doing so, the imaginary contradiction between analog and digital is reflected upon critically, and the informal exchange from the digital hub will be brought back to the analog salon—and vice versa.

So Far, Still So Close during Gallery Weekend Berlin 2019

Nikita Shalenny, The Bridge, 2017 // Yu Hong, She’s Already Gone, 2017 // Courtesy of Khora Contemporary

So Far, Still So Close - A VR Art Exhibiton

Yu Hong & Nikita Shalenny 

April 26th - 28th, 2019

peer to space’s director Tina Sauerlaender curates together with George Vitale (Synthesis Gallery) the exhibition So Far, Still So Close. This is the first collaboration between Khora Contemporary (Copenhagen, Denmark), Radiance VR (co-founded by Sauerlaender) and Synthesis Gallery (Berlin, Germany). 

Both artists, Yu Hong and Nikita Shalenny, in their artistic practice deal with the altering passage of time. In Hong’s ‘She’s Already Gone’, the narrative follows differing timelines as the life and aging of the protagonist moves forward while history goes backwards. Nikita Shalenny’s work is mentally extended to infinity. The bridge and the horizon are set between two places. The horizon disappears within space, yet the strong conviction that there is a better world beyond the horizon lives on. Both artists create drawings and paintings by hand that are later transferred into the virtual space to become animated artworks. The visible brush strokes add a layer of physicality to the virtual world.

Opening reception:  April 26th 2019, 6-9pm
Private view: April 26th 2019, 5pm (by invitation only)
Exhibition dates: April 26th - April 28th 2019, 1am-7pm
At: Synthesis Gallery, Kopernikusstrasse 14, 10245 Berlin, Germany

peer to space’s curator Peggy Schoenegge at Hauptsache Frei – Festival of Performing Arts

Peggy Schoenegge will be part of the panel DISKURS #2: DIGITAL*ANALOG at this year’s Hauptsache Frei – Festival of Performing Arts on April 7th, 2019. Together with Alexandra Wolf, Friedrich Kirschner and Susanne Schuster she will be talking about the interrelation between the digital and the analog and its influence on the perception of art.

Further information

Group Show on New Media Art at Goethe Media Space, Toronto

TOUCHING FROM A DISTANCE II - Transmediations in the Digital Age

Commissioned & presented by the Goethe-Institut Toronto
Co-presented with Hot Docs, Images Festival & Digifest

Artists: Jonas Blume (DE), Manja Ebert (DE), Ornella Fieres (DE), Aron Lesnik (DE), Lorna Mills (CAN), Sarah Oh-Mock (DE), Julia Charlotte Richter (DE), Anna Ridler (UK), The Swan Collective (DE), Tina Wilke (DE).

Curated by Tina Sauerländer (peer to space)

Opening & Artist Talk: Friday, March 22, 2019, 6:30 pm

Goethe Media Space, 100 University Ave, North Tower, 2nd floor, Toronto, Canada

Jonas Blume, Predictive Biography, 2018 © the artist

Ornella Fieres, As if we are passing through tunnels, Video (Still), 2017 © the artist

Sarah Oh-Mock, You Want It Darker, Video (Still), 2017/18 © the artist

Tina Wilke, GLOCAL, Argentina / Bolivia, 2012-2018, Video (Still) © the artist

Aron Lesnik, IMITATIO, Video (Still), 2018 © the artist

The Swan Collective, Here We Are - A Turing Torture, 2018, VR Experience (Still), 2018 © the artists

Julia Charlotte Richter, Das kleine Rotkäppchen (Little Red Riding Hood), Video (Still), 2011 © the artist

Touching From A Distance presents recent digital art works immersed into the book shelves and media hardware at the Goethe Media Space. All works deal with transmediation, the process of translating information between different co-existing media–analog or digital, written or visual. The concept of transmediation reflects our daily internet routine, as we stay connected via intangible yet visible information. The band Joy Division praised the effect of music conveyed through the radio with their 1979 song Transmission: “Touching from a distance...sound, that's all we need to synchronise.” Today, digital data reaches and connects us as we post images, create short videos, or use emojis.

The 10 featured works build bridges between literature, language, digital art or VR. Ornella Fieres explores the transitions between analog and digital imagery; Anna Ridler transforms Edgar Allan Poe’s Fall of the House of Usher into an AI animation based on the artist’s drawings; Aron Lesnik creates uncanny animations of people talking about the advantages of reading.

The exhibition is the 2nd version of TOUCHING FROM A DISTANCE, organized by medienkunstverein.com and Literaturhaus Berlin, curated by Manja Ebert, Tina Sauerländer and Peggy Schoenegge in 2018.

The exhibition includes a world premiere by Lorna Mills as well as 6 North American and 3 Canadian premieres.

Duration: Fri, 03/22/2019 - Thu, 05/23/2019

More information

SPECULATIVE CULTURES - A Virtual Reality Exhibition

Matias Brunacci, Virtualshamanism, VR experience, 2018

Artists:  Morehshin Allahyari (IRN/US), Scott Benesiinaabandan (CAN), Matias Brunacci (ARG/DE), Yu Hong (CHN), Francois Knoetze (ZAF), Erin Ko (US) & Jamie Martinez (COL/US)
Curators: Tina Sauerlaender & Peggy Schoenegge (DE), and Erandy Vergara (MX/CA)
At: Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Gallery, Sheila C. Johnson Design Center, Parsons School of Design at The New School , 2 West 13th St, Ground Floor, New York, USA
Opening: February 7, 2019, 6- 8 pm
Artists' Tour: February 8, 6:30-7:30 p.m.
Duration: February 7, 2019 - April 14, 2019.

Cultures have never existed in a set state. They are all in constant flux brought about by social, economic, and technological developments. The global flow of people forges change, adaptation of norms and the creation of new forms for human societies, religions, rituals, or spoken languages. These processes of change lead to the adoption of new tools or practices and therefore can be considered as engine for progress, growth, and innovation. The new tools of the digital age offer new possibilities for cultures to exist, evolve, and consolidate. Virtual Reality allows artists to speculate about new manifestations of cultural expressions within the conditions of the digital realm. Independent of physical surroundings, new spaces spring into existence. Through their works, the artists shape their hopes and desires into virtual environments representing imagined cultures. Their speculative virtual worlds create different perspectives on established narratives and traditions, as well as images and symbols. The artists’ projects thereby open possibilities for leaving accustomed views and familiar structures behind and exploring different notions of one’s own personal surroundings and conditions of human existence.

This show is part of the exhibition series Critical Approaches in Virtual Reality Art, which was developed by Erandy Vergara and Tina Sauerlaender at the invitation of the Goethe-Institut and Studio XX in Montréal. This series brings together Erandy Vergara's engagement with postcolonial and feminist perspectives on media art and theory and Tina Sauerlaender's curatorial engagement with digital technologies and Virtual Reality.  

Presented in partnership with the Consulate General of Canada in New York.

Talk on Virtual Reality & Art at LMU Munich by Tina Sauerlaender

Image.: Scrubbing 1, Maquette, 2017 by Rachel Rossin (Postmasters Gallery)

As a part of the lecture series on Digital Art History at the KHI (Department for Art History) of the LMU University Munich, Germany, peer to space’s director Tina Sauerlaender gives a talk on Immersion & Virtual Reality in Art and Art History (in German).

January 22, 2019, 7 pm, at Institut für Kunstgeschichte, Zentnerstr. 31, Raum 007 im EG

Further Information (Germany only)

Inside Out > Solo Show Of Tatjana Schülke

peer to space’s curator Peggy Schoenegge curates Tatjana Schülke’s solo exhibition at Kunsthaus Dahlem. The exhibition Inside Out shows 15 recent works, which illustrate the artist's experimentation with different materials. In addition to the relationship between material, form and surface, the tension between internal and external effects is elementary.

The exhibition takes place from January 18th to April 8th 2019.

Further information

SELFIE CULTURE SYMPOSIUM at Kunstuni Linz

The symposium is organized by peer to space’s director Tina Sauerlaender.

More information

THIS COULD BE YOU – Disembodiment in Virtual Reality Art

THIS COULD BE YOU – Disembodiment in Virtual Reality Art

With: Claire Hentschker (US), Jessy Jetpacks (ARE/ UK), Martina Menegon (IT/AUT), Zeesy Powers (US)

Curated by: Peggy Schoenegge (peer to space)

At: Overkill Festival, The Netherlands

From: November 23rd to 25th, 2018

Today we communicate via several digital applications, and present our identity on the Internet. Social VR enables us to meet our friends’ avatars in a virtual space independently from our body’s actual place. Thus being evocative of the plot of the Sci-Fi movie Matrix (1999), in which the physical body stays in a bunk while the consciousness acts in a virtual place.

Martina Menegon, All Around Me Are Familiar Faces, artistic VR experience, still, 2018

In 1991, Hans Moravec wrote in his essay The Universal Robot that the human body is disused and won’t be necessary in our future anymore. He said it would be possible to download one’s consciousness to a computer. By transferring the mind to a technological medium the body would becomes insignificant. As a result human beings would not be embodied and their existence would not depend on biological mortality anymore. Consequently human beings would become immortal.

With recent technological progress Moravec’s idea no longer seems completely absurd. Virtual Reality (VR) as a technological and artistic medium enables users to experience disembodiment. The exhibition THIS COULD BE YOU. Disembodiment in Virtual Reality is dedicated to the feeling of incorporeality. The title refers to Zeesy Powers’ eponymous VR artwork, in which the user inhabits the body of an old woman. Over the course of time the body of the old woman becomes the body of the user. Entering a virtual world allow users to immerse themselves in a completely different place without a physical body. There, users can be everyone and everything. Feeling present in the virtual space, makes them forget about their bodies in reality.

VR experiences implicate future living scenarios but also reflect the current state of our society and its relation to technology. Claire Hentschker shows a deserted world without any humans. While reflecting the presence, her work gives an impression of what a disembodied future of formerly inhabited places could look like. Jessy Jetpacks plays with the re-embodiment in the virtual room and questions wether our bodies have a memory and if such an experience has consequences. Martina Menegon and Zeesy Powers also confront the users with bodies that are not theirs. While Menegon provides her 3D scanned face as a mask-like object, the users interact with; Powers mirrors the user as a 90 years old woman. By doing so, they create a vision of what life with an immaterial body could be like and what it might or might not feel like.

THIS COULD BE YOU. Disembodiment in Virtual Reality is part of the Overkill Festival 2018 in Enschede (NL). The festival regroups art, games, movies and performances and opens a new discourse.

The artistic VR experiences are presented in cooperation with Radiance VR.

Link to the Facebook Event

Website of Overkill Festival