74 million million million tons

About

Work by Shadi Habib Allah, George Awde, Carolina Fusilier, Sidsel Meineche Hansen, Hiwa K, Nicholas Mangan, Sean Raspet and Nonfood, Susan Schuppli, Daniel R. Small, and Hong-Kai Wang. Curated by Ruba Katrib and Lawrence Abu Hamdan. 

Individuals and objects contribute to and corroborate accounts of a significant event, or shift, in material, social, technological, and/or political realities. But before this happens, there is a period of time between the event and its subsequent narratives when a lapse in comprehension exists. Before there is consensus or familiarity with a fundamental change in understanding, the parts must be identified and pieced together. The artists in this exhibition directly intervene in these moments to expand on the devices for measurement and documentation of what has yet to become widely known or accepted. They make potential future documents that reflect a range of subjectivities, human and otherwise. By operating inside the delays, silent pauses, sensory impairments, and omissions, the artists examine the shape and weigh the force of these gaps, not only as absences but also as sources of knowledge.

In their approach to subjects and objects, these artists do not consider form the only means of producing the metaphoric or symbolic. Their materials do not simply stand in for or index broader concepts and political issues, but move beyond the role of representation to become elements that are integral to the relevant events. The poetics of their work is embedded in the rigor of their investigations and the intensity of their observations. These artists operate at the limits of perception and detectability, they create a new visual lexicon through which those at the threshold of politics can emerge—the refugee, the robot, the environment, and others on the outskirts of legality. They anticipate and produce material documents even before the process has been deemed necessary.

PART OF LIC ARTS OPEN FESTIVAL.