Agile Acceleration

About

AGILE ACCELERATION
Inna Artemova
15.04. - 28.04.2021
Curated by Eleonora Frolov

Please scroll down for the German version!

Inna Artemova's expansive installation ‘Agile Acceleration’ is posing a question:
“HOW DO WE WANT TO LIVE IN THE FUTURE?”

In the world premiere of the opera ‘Violet Snow’ (‘Violetter Schnee’) in 2019, the Russian writer Vladimir Sorokin anticipated the effects of a state of emergency on human existence even before the outbreak of the current pandemic. Society is isolated, sealed off, life paralyzed by a snowstorm, the world order shaken. People experience gruelling uncertainty, isolation, and are being thrust back at themselves. Time seems to standstill. A year later we experience how a virus, just like that snowstorm, is tearing people out of their normal lives and displacing them en masse from the cities. Invisible particles provoke the future and accelerate progress. How will we live in the future and what will our living space look like?

The Italian geologist Antonio Stoppani wrote as early as 1873 that there was "a new telluric power that could rival the great forces of nature in terms of strength and universality". In this context, he spoke of the “Anthropocene Age”.

Inna Artemova draws visionary ideas for her imagery from her memory and imagination. In the expansive installation ‘Agile Acceleration’ she plays out the architectural vision of a future city as a common living space in a thought experiment: in the metropolis, in the country, vertically, horizontally, evolutionary, modular, agile, and changeable. The city as a way of life adapts to our needs and not the other way around, it is always on the move.

Modular cubes float vertically, leave the picture, and arrange themselves in space. Being agile, they change their position and adapt to new requirements. Seemingly unpredictable, they follow very specific algorithms to shape a sustainable, humane city. We are watching the process of creation.

The city reflects how a society organises itself. Existing hierarchies have been dissolved by working from home and replaced by networks. According to Niklas Maak gigantic ruins of modern society are forming in the cities. Urban architecture has often been transformed in the wake of disasters, it has become more hygienic and more resource-efficient. Environmentally friendly and bio-based concepts are being discussed for the future.

In a field test, Inna Artemova designs an agile landscape as a prototype city of the future: flexible, mobile, networked, and self-organized. A call to challenge the complexity of our present and to courageously reinvent the city of the future.

Eleonora Frolov, curator

Inna Artemova says: „The perspective of the drawings and lines is directed towards the viewer, who is positioned in a marked position in front of the entrance door. This allows them a spatial immersion in the emerging fictional world. At the same time, these drawings and lines dissolve the existing space in its previous form and open up new visual and mental spaces.

On view are utopian landscapes. The square spatial bodies that are central here not only represent a basic geometric form; they also stand for a fundamental spatial form of human coexistence. Their floating state can be read as a metaphor for an aspired utopian ideal state. It also represents a mental openness to new possibilities of living together.”

Inna Artemova, born in Moscow, studied architecture at the Moscow Architectural Institute (MArchI). For her diploma project, she received the 2nd prize from the Russian Federation. In 1998 she moved to Berlin and started to focus on her work as an artist in the field of painting and drawing. Recently, Inna Artemova has participated in: the Lahore Biennale, Pakistan (2020), and in 2019, the Kyrgyz National Museum of Fine Arts presented her works in the solo show “Landscapes of Tomorrow”. She has had numerous solo and group exhibitions in Germany, Austria and Italy. Additionally, her works were shown at international art fairs in Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Denmark, the US, and Japan. Inna lives and works in Berlin.

Eleonora Frolov is an international exhibition maker and works for galleries and for private collections. In her curatorial practice, Frolov examines digital transformation and the new possibilities it opens up for global networking, creating new, accessible, technology-based art, knowledge, and documentation spaces. Most recently, Eleonora Frolov curated an Art Biennale in Worpswede, dedicated to failed technological and social utopias of Russian Modernism and ‘The sea used to be here’, with Anastasia Khoroshilova.

Frolov's exhibitions have a clear thematic focus, such as iconoclasm, among others. 'You shouldn't make a picture’ 2014, 'The rest' 2015, 'A picture is not a picture is a picture' 2016 and 'Once the sea was here’ Anastasia Khoroshilova, as well as Matthias Koch’s 'Normandy - Atlantic Wall' 2017. She worked with Luc Tuymans, Guenter Weseler, Dieter Hacker, Carla Guagliardi for exhibitions and artist books.

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Inna Artemovas raumgreifende Installation „Agile Acceleration“ stellt die Frage: „HOW DO WE WANT TO LIVE IN THE FUTURE?”

Kuratiert von Eleonora Frolov

In der Uraufführung des Stückes „Violetter Schnee“ nimmt der russische Dramatiker Vladimir Sorokin 2019 die Auswirkungen eines Ausnahmezustandes auf das Menschsein noch vor dem Ausbruch der gegenwärtigen Pandemie vorweg: Die Gesellschaft ist abgeschottet, das Leben ist durch einen Schneesturm lahmgelegt, die Weltordnung erschüttert. Die Menschen erfahren eine zermürbende Ungewissheit, Isolation und das Zurückgeworfensein auf sich selbst. Die Zeit scheint still zu stehen. Ein Jahr später erleben wir, wie ein kleines Virus, analog zu jenem Schneesturm, die Menschen aus ihrer Lebensnormalität herausreißt und massenhaft aus den Städten verdrängt. Unsichtbare Teilchen provozieren die Zukunft und beschleunigen den Fortschritt. Wie werden wir in Zukunft leben, und wie wird unser Lebensraum aussehen?

Der italienische Geologe Antonio Stoppani schrieb bereits 1873, es gäbe "eine neue tellurische Macht, die es an Kraft und Universalität mit den großen Gewalten der Natur" aufnehmen könne und spricht in diesem Zusammenhang vom "anthropozänen Zeitalter".

Inna Artemova schöpft aus ihrer Erinnerung und subjektiven Vorstellungskraft visionäre Ideen für ihre Bilderwelten. In der raumgreifenden Installation „Agile Acceleration“ spielt sie in einem Gedankenexperiment die architektonische Vision einer künftigen Stadt als (Zusammen)Lebensraum durch: in der Metropole, auf dem Land, vertikal, horizontal, evolutionär, modular, agil und wandelbar. Die Stadt als Lebensform passt sich unseren Bedürfnissen an und nicht umgekehrt, sie ist immer in Bewegung.

Modulare Würfel schweben in der Vertikalen, verlassen das Bild und bauen sich im Raum auf. Agil verändern sie ihre Position und passen sich neuen Anforderungen an. Scheinbar unberechenbar folgen sie doch ganz bestimmten Algorithmen, durch die eine nachhaltige menschengerechte Stadt geformt wird. Wir schauen dem Prozess bei der Entstehung zu.

Die Stadt bildet ab, wie eine Gesellschaft sich organisiert. Durch Homeoffice haben sich bestehende Hierarchien aufgelöst, an ihre Stelle sind Netzwerke getreten. In den Städten entstehen gigantische Ruinen der modernen Gesellschaft, sagt Niklas Maak. Die Architektur der Stadt hat sich in der Folge von Katastrophen schon oft transformiert, sie wurde hygienischer, Ressourcen sparender. Für die Zukunft werden umweltfreundliche und biobasierte Konzepte diskutiert.

Inna Artemova gestaltet in einem Feldversuch eine agile Lebenslandschaft als Stadt der Zukunft, flexibel, beweglich, vernetzt und selbstorganisiert. Ein Plädoyer dafür, sich der Komplexität unserer Gegenwart zu stellen und mutig die Stadt der Zukunft neuzuerfinden.

Eleonora Frolov, Kuratorin

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IT MAY SOUND UTOPIAN
Exhibition-Relay 2021
10 Shows, 10 Artists, 4 Guest Curators
Curated by Jung Me Chai & Anna Ratcliffe

Think about the alarming crises in the world. The spreading pandemic, racism and discrimination, growing far-right propaganda, international terrorism, and climate change are to name a few of the perceived threats to our existence. Some people are paralyzed by uncertainty in this unpredictable time, and yes, we are also confronted with severe socio-economic problems. In addition, this unexpected crisis has, unfortunately, accelerated the rate of restrictions on civil liberties, and mass surveillance methods have uninterruptedly risen.

Even if it may sound utopian, we are forced to think about new models of “how we live” in these perilous times. The image of “Utopia” may be a romantic and unrealistic concept, but it is an urgent one as we try to revise our current problems.

Under the title ‘IT MAY SOUND UTOPIAN’, DISKURS Berlin launches the second round of Exhibition-Relay, encouraging creative thinkers to create personal utopias in this unpredictable and vulnerable world.