Analia Saban: Synthetic Self

About

The work of Analia Saban, which spans a plethora of media and approaches, has consistently explored the meanings we give to the objects and technologies that inform our everyday lives. Comprising sculpture, painting, tapestries and other newly reimagined artistic media, the exhibition investigates subjects of paramount importance today at the intersection of environmental concerns, artificial intelligence and human creativity.

The works brought together in Synthetic Self extend many of the concepts in Saban's practice over nearly two decades, including the connection between analog and digital tools and approaches, while also introducing others for the first time. At Sprüth Magers, a group of tapestries woven from copper and linen present an image that recurs throughout the exhibition: the computer fan. Saban's tapestries have a regal quality to them, their brocade patterns shimmering and shifting as light passes over them. But their content here is far more humble, presenting racks of repeating fans, similar to those that cool the massive servers that power many aspects of contemporary life, from online shopping to cryptocurrency. Ironically, that cooling power and energy consumption contributes to the heating of the planet, and the fans' perpetual multiplication in Saban's new weavings emphasizes this cyclical futility in an equally ironic, yet sublime, manner.

Across its series and locations, Synthetic Self taps into the trappings of our particular moment, in which developing systems of thought, computation and creation are ushering in both new horizons and new anxieties over the power of artificial intelligence and the environmental results of human industry alike. Rather than offering any judgments or forecasts, Saban instead winds these numerous threads together, proposing hybrid forms, materials and frameworks through which to consider these concerns—with depth as well as levity.