The Echo System

About

THE ECHO SYSTEM

The Echo System is a derivative of ‘echo chamber’ and ‘ecosystem’. An ‘echo chamber’ is a metaphor used to define a hermetic system of opinions and beliefs that are reinforced by repetition through different communication channels. In the ‘echo chamber’, people can lose their ability to recognise biased information, inhibiting their capacity to engage with the world in a non-biased way.

An ecosystem, in the broadest sense, is a system in which all living and non-living elements coexist in the most self-sustainable way. An ecosystem depends on a variety of external and internal factors. If subjected to periodic or long-term disturbances, it will be affected and suffer greatly or even irreparably.

The Echo System’s complex interrelations exist between living organisms and non-living elements. Metaphorically speaking, they are a constellation of things where individual elements act or appear anarchic and irrelevant to each other, yet together they inevitably form a whole. Whether it is a self-sustainable or entropic system depends on how these elements – including people – relate to each other.

ARTISTS' BIOS:

Natasha Bird
Lives and works in London
www.natashabird.co.uk
Instagram: @natashabird

Natasha makes sculptural objects that speak about industrial and bodily functions. Her current work is concerned with aspects of city water infrastructures, ideas of flow and stagnation and their potential for production; and how these relate to the experience of being a body inside a system. She is currently undertaking a research residency at the heritage site of Crossness Pumping Station, supported by TACO! Past exhibitions include Earth Eaters (Cole Projects, London, 2020), Moloko Plus Six (Thamesmead Texas, London, 2019), The Polder as a Cyborg (solo exhibition at Cultureland, Amsterdam, 2018), Testbed Alice (The Old Waterworks, Southend, 2017) and STEAM symposium (screening at BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK). Natasha has participated in residencies at Cultureland (Netherlands), Catalyst Arts at the Curfew Tower (Northern Ireland) and Trelex Residency (Switzerland).

Lewis Davidson
Lives and works in London
www.lewis-davidson.com
Instagram: @lewisdavidsn

Lewis Davidson is a multimedia artist. Working with the broken, unwanted and overlooked materials at the end of consumerism’s conveyor belt. Lewis reassesses the qualities that define value and purpose in contemporary culture through assemblage and displacement. Lewis received his BA in Fine Art from Chelsea School of Art and Design, and MFA in Sculpture from Slade School of Fine Art. He is a recipient of the Felix Slade Scholarship and the Deans Bursary, as well as the Almacantar Studio Award. His recent residencies include Duo Residency (Unit 1, London, 2020). Exhibitions include Gargle (Bow Arts, London, 2020),Season of Fire from the Passenger Seat (Raw Labs, London, 2020), Adjacent Directly (Unit 1, London, 2019), Holiday (ARCADE, London, 2018), Catch of the Year (DIENSTGEBÄUDE, Zürich, 2017), Art@Tell, University of St. Gallen, Switzerland (2014-2016) (touring) and The Observer Effect (GEMAK, The Hague, 2015).

Nathaniel Faulkner
Lives and works in London
www.nathanielfaulkner.com
Instagram: @nat_faulkner

Nathaniel is a multimedia artist, who seeks to explore archetypal motifs and imagery through sculpture, installation and other mediums. Fossilisation serves as an analogy for Nathaniel’s more recent works, as he gathers, processes and turns over or puts under a pressure the original material until it is replaced with a concentrated crystalline equivalent. His approach to different histories is eclectic, celebrating anachronism and ‘alternative fact’. Nathaniel received his BA in Fine Arts from Central Saint Martins. His recent exhibitions include Bold Tendencies Summer Programme (Bold Tendencies, London, 2020), Like A Sieve (Kupfer, London, 2020), Exceptional (Collyer Bristow / Graduate Art Award, London, 2019), Commixture (Koppel Project Hive, London, 2019), Showerthoughts (San Mei Gallery, London, 2019), Italian for Beginners (Apthorp Gallery, London, 2019).

Gabriela Giroletti
Lives and works in London
www.gabrielagiroletti.com
Instagram: @gabrielagiroletti

Gabriela’s paintings are ambiguous, borderline figurations, encouraging the viewer to formulate associations with our concrete surroundings. These abstractions are also a reflection on our ability to relate to things subjectively based on our experiences sieved through our own bodies. The paintings jolt between their crude materiality, layered and reworked surfaces, and their metaphysical aspect, a push and pull game that has been repeatedly present in discussions around painting. Gabriela was Honorary Research Associate at Slade School of Fine Art. Her most recent exhibitions include Facing the Sun (Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, Schloss Goerne, Germany, 2021), At Once and a Touch Away (Studio KIND, Braunton, UK, 2021), III AORA Space (AORA, London, 2021), Wabi – Sabi (Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, London, 2021), London Now (Space K, Gwacheon, South Korea, 2020), Bloomberg New Contemporaries (South London Gallery, 2020).

Milda Lembertaitė
Lives and works in London
Instagram: @mildalembertaite

By weaving together natural and technological objects, and drawing from personal, collective and geological histories, Milda blurs the boundary between human and non-human experiences. She nods to what is sometimes a beautiful, sometimes tragic, but always shared, fate and asks: how can we remember where we came from? What does it mean ‘to protect’ using technologies that intrinsically are also harmful? Milda received her MA in Fine Art from Chelsea College of Art and BA BA in Performance Design and Practice from Central Saint Martins, London. Selected exhibitions and residencies include: VOLUMES (Kunsthalle, Zurich, 2019), Can You Feel It? (Last Tango, Zurich, 2019), Beep (DANCE4, Nottingham, 2019), Swiss Art Awards 2019 (Halle 4, Art Basel, 2019), RA Lates: Transcendence (London, 2019), The Day Of The Dead (British Library, London, 2019), Air Berlin (Alexanderplatz, Berlin, 2018-19), LabVerde, Art/ Nature/ Science Programme (The Amazon, Brazil, 2018), I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For Ice Cream (Fondazione Baruchello, Rome, 2017), 5 Proposals (HGB Gallery, Leipzig, 2017), Perímetro: Cine Expandido, (Centro de Cultura Digital, Mexico City, 2016), Che c’è di nuovo? (MASI, Lugano, 2016) and others.

Milda Batakyte
Lives and works in London and Vilnius
Instagram: @mildabatakyte

Milda’s curatorial research revolves around current socio-political questions and how these feed into making and exhibiting art; her curatorial research outcome is abstract and lyrical, and therefore can have an open ended interpretation. Milda works as an independent curator and Acting Director of Rupert, centre for arts, residencies and alternative education in Vilnius. She is the assistant curator of the Lithuanian Pavilion at the 17th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia and the editor of the publication Lithuanian Space Agency: Annual Report No.1. Her other most recent exhibitions include More More More Morph! (Chalton Gallery, London, 2019), Coming to Terms with Sociotechnical Discrepancies (12 Star Gallery, London, 2018). She received her MFA degree in Curating from Goldsmiths, University of London.

Participating artists: Natasha Bird, Lewis Davidson, Nathaniel Faulkner, Gabriela Giroletti and Milda Lembertaitė
Organised by Milda Batakyte
Graphic design by Studio Pointer * (@pointer_studio)