Exhibition: “On Alchemy and Magic” @ De Brakke Grond, Amsterdam, NL

After a successful first exhibition in STUK, Leuven, Artefact establishes a second act at de Brakke Grond: an exhibition on the hyperrationality of thechnology.

From automated consumer electronics and computer information systems to high frequency trading, complex systems are mapping, intervening and creating the experience of the everyday in contemporary society. Their internal logic seems to be hyper-rational, beyond what most human minds can come to understand, intentionally designed to surpass it. But in its far-driven logical functioning, these systems seem to be touching that which goes beyond the rational. Is there a bridge to be made between the hyper-rational and the irrational? How do we make sense of it? And how can concepts such as ‘alchemy’ and ‘magics’ assist in a different understanding of these systems? Will this in fact result in a different relation with these systems? Or do we continue to struggle in a distanced dark?