SITUATION #215

Digital and networked images multiply and accumulate on hard drives, phones, USB sticks and servers. Our old media (storage) devices remain filled with data that never dies. Erasing our entire digital footprint seems not only a Sisyphean task, but also a frightening prospect. We never seem to be quite ready to let go of our images. We’d rather – often also unknowingly – sacrifice swarms of private pictures to feed the surveillance systems of social networking sites than risk to losing them or putting in time and effort to get rid of them. Goodnight Sweetheart by artist-research duo FRAUD (Audrey Samson & Francisco Gallardo) is an installation of six embalmed data storage devices, which showcase the results of digital data funerals – symbolic exorcisms for undead media. Through these apparently futile attempts at erasure, FRAUD offer an act of closure through ritual, while simultaneously reflecting on the politics of deletion. But even if our digital devices are poured in epoxy and our image data is embalmed and thus laid to rest: can we really escape the unavoidable, ever-increasing and persistent datafication of our society?

For the finissage event of SITUATIONS/Closure, the artists will embalm some of the audience’s digital data in a public event. Detailed information will follow soon.

The artists dedicate their exhibition contribution to the memory of Hadrien Guimond 2000-2020.

More by FRAUD: fraud.la