Judith Fischer & Claudia Hardi: transmission

Exhibition at the Kunstpavillon, 11.01.2006 to 03.02.2006
Artist talk, Kunstpavillon, 11.01.2006

transmission: transference (including motion, energy, waves, pulses, heat quantities, infections, viruses), transfer, transit, send over, continuous connection.

The exhibition showed both collaborative and individual works by Judith Fischer & Claudia Hardi. The collaborative contribution was directly related to the scryptic spatial installation Predatory Information Sequences. New Games New Players—Sequence 1: The Shining, which the artists had realized in Büchsenhausen in June 2005. At the Kunstpavilion, the wooden structure that in Büchsenhausen had been covered with a thin, paper skin to create a room was laid out as a grid on the floor; a series of hand-printed T-shirts—a design also based on Predatory Information Sequences—was likewise arranged in a circle on the floor and served as a symbolic connector between the various solo works by Judith Fischer and those of Claudia Hardi.

 

Contributions by Judith Fischer:

Haunted House, photographic installation, approx. 60 photographs, 20 x 30 cm, visual research 2004–06

Judith Fischer writes: “The idea of residual energies stored in buildings that (can) make themselves known has fascinated me for many years. It has to do with areas in which fact and fiction, self and foreign material, film and literature meet and mingle. It is also about media transfer and generations—and thus also the status of the (analog) visual material I am working with.”

Remember, sculpture, 2005

The sculptural lamp object refers to a (relatively unknown) British horror film from the seventies: The Tower of Evil aka Snape Island. The lamp is a reconstructed prop from that movie. In the film, the lamp is used as a “pseudo-scientific hypnosis machine” and an “anti-traumatization apparatus”.

Hotel Paradiso, video, 2006, 10:43 min.

The short film Hotel Paradiso was screened at the opening. Judith Fischer says of this work: “I shot 16-mm film at Martelltal in South Tyrol. In the mid-1930s, Italian architect Gio Ponti built a hotel there 2,160 meters above sea level and it has been deteriorating for decades. Writing for the NZZ in 1998, Gabriele Reiterer described it as a “colonialist act”, saying that for inhabitants of the valley, this hotel serves as a “monumental sign of the [facist, ed. Judith Fischer] occupation.” Starting 1943, the building was occupied by the German Wehrmacht and the SS. The hotel has had many owners since then, and even the color of its façade has changed from light green to “rosso veneziano”. Shot on reversal film and generally underexposed, the material has a haunted quality. Adding to this impression is the sound of Taiwanese electronic music by sound artist Pei.

Individual cadres from Hotel Paradiso were shown as photographs in the exhibition.

 

Contribution by Claudia Hardi:

As We May Think, database/encyclopedia 2004–06, installation

As We May Think (AWMT) is the title of a scientific publication written by computer pioneer Vannevar Bush (1890-1974). Bush was a key figure in the development of hypertext. His concept for a “Memex” (memory extender) system was the first to present the idea of an easily accessible, individually configurable archive of knowledge. Bush described “Memex” as a theoretical machine that expands the human memory and allows users to store documents and find them again by association. These associative links were very similar to the hypertext we know today. Yet Vannevar Bush would never experience the internet’s evolution. He died before it was invented.

The AWMT Database is a collection of data such as web pages, text and images based on references from the Jargon File 4.3.1. These references are people, books, comics, TV shows, movies, logos and places. The database includes about 240 folders, each of which contains a reference to a folder of material. The collected material is archived in an information manager—a “Freeform Database Software”—called Devon Think. The Jargon File is a hacker lexicon. It is a collection of colloquial expressions used by various subcultures of computer hackers. The main topics in this lexicon are: programming, computer science, electronics and other areas related to hacker culture as well as, for example, science fiction, comics, computer games and movies. The Jargon File can be found in the public domain under www.catb.org/jargon and may be freely used, shared and improved upon. This lexicon was the starting point of Claudia Hardi’s intensive internet search for all references loosely describing the development of the first phase and philosophy behind the internet. The AWMT Database is a rewriting of existing materials, based on associations from this research.

Claudia Hardi developed the conceptual structure for this database from March 2004 to March 2005. It was then presented in a reading and a subsequent workshop with an installation. The workshop and associated installation were an inventory of stories, which is why they can also be regarded as a comprehensive project documentation and catalogue system, which was published in the form of this installation at Kunstpavillon. AWMT was thus conceived as a work in progress, allowing the continued editing and modification of the database-context and content.

www.awmt.net

www.awmt.info

Claudia Hardi’s contribution to the exhibition transmission was supported by Ho&Ruck Gebrauchtmöbel.

Judith Fischer (*1967, Hallstatt/A), writer and artist, works conceptually and artistically in the fields and context of literature, philosophy, (horror) film, theory and visual art and completed postgraduate studies at the Jan van Eyck Academie, Maastricht and at the Bauhaus Kolleg, Dessau. Publications and projects include Vampiric, 2002; I saw her. I saw her, 2003; Predator & Prey, 2004. Film: Dark.Reading, 2005, SOME—Women, Hauses, Phantoms 2000-2010, 2010.

Claudia Hardi (*1969, St.Gallen/CH) worked at that time as a computer artist, information designer and internet researcher in Maastricht. Her exploratory mode of research is focused on the correlation between popular culture, computer science and the comic and game culture. She studied urban planning, fine art and new media. Projects include As We May Think Database, 2004/05 and Dream Machines, 2005.

www.awmt.info
www.malloryneelyhouse.net

Location

Kunstpavillon
Rennweg 8a
A-6020 Innsbruck

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