the speed at which global events manifest through media changes not only the informational landscape, but also the emotional economy. i am sorry takes this condition as its point of departure: eight printers respond to updates from conflict zones in the world's most relevant news feeds — not with analysis, but with expression.

algorithms have no sense of a society's underlying mood, yet they actively shape it. i am sorry articulates one facet of this atmosphere and translates it into a physical gesture. through the continuous repetition of the phrase, meaning turns into structure, information into surface. what is repeated loses reference; what accumulates gains form.

the writer eva menasse has described the social pressure to make public declarations — morally unambiguous, immediate, visible. i am sorry does not take up this impulse as a position, but as an automated gesture. the work transfers the principle of confession into a structure without a subject — neither clearly addressed nor ever complete.

catch me if you cam stages an encounter with a computer component that appears vulnerable in its exposed state. the webcam sensor — open, unprotected, without a lens — reacts hypersensitively to light, movement, and presence. it registers without recognising, records without forming an image. this shifts the function of the camera from a tool of representation to a sensitive surface that renders proximity perceptible without translating it into stable forms. information emerges that remains tangible, yet not clearly legible.

a curtain printed with a pattern of webcam covers becomes the projection surface for this unstable image. like the covers themselves, it marks an attempt to draw a boundary — pragmatic in use, yet symbolic as a sign of protection. in the overlap between everyday practice and image carrier, a relation appears that remains both familiar and distrustful. catch me if you cam makes this ambivalence visible — not through clarity, but through the radical blur of an interface that perceives everything and understands nothing.

sometimes, fragility in a conversation arises precisely where information is reflected. at least in an acoustic sense, this statement holds true. but whether acoustic or not – any informational relationship always requires a space as its foundation.

mixed / signals is an audiovisual performance that explores the acoustic interaction between audience and space. the audience's soundscape serves as the musical raw material, which is processed to the point where only sine waves remain. these sine waves are then used as an element for improvisation. in this way, the audience immerses itself in a sound bath created from its own noises. while the audience experiences an intense, physical sonic sensation, the performer maintains strict control over the sounds with utmost concentration, creating a highly charged atmosphere.

picture: clemens radauer

the radical attachment of dust is just one reason why we don't want it with us. nevertheless, it tells the material history of a society and continues to write it unasked but reliably. in this way, dust fulfils one of the tasks that museums are trying hard to master. furthermore, this attempt creates even more dust.

another one hides the dust is a transdisciplinary study that explores and manipulates the value of institutional dust.

how the moral compass and consumer behaviour of a society, but also the individual living in it, is aligned depends on many parameters. geflecht um leben und tod examines such dependencies based on the perception of the individual in question. robin lütolf stages a study of braids and their images as a semiotic field of tension between beauty, disgust and death.

text: xpon-art gallery

our habits are not taking anything away from our living space, but they are changing it into something else. and if nothing is taken away, nothing can be given back.

i put a spit on you is an installation that deals with the co₂ compensation trend in times of climate crisis. human spit drips onto the image of a lake that is already past its best.

humankind has probably not yet succeeded in getting time, one of the most natural phenomena of all, under control. and yet, the clock has become a symbol that makes us believe in it in our everyday lives.

basically, time makes everything dependent on itself. in a three-dimensional space in particular, it can be perceived very differently – and so can space and its changes. but the distance between perception and truth is too great to be perceived. the sociologist william isaac thomas confirmed the observation that actions do not follow from the truth, but from what is believed to be true.

however, in order to retain control over this text, we will combine the terms perception/truth for this section, as both have an ambivalent relationship to habit, which, in any case, takes the upper hand in everyday life. david hume put it more precisely: "it is not reason that is the guide of life, but habit".

leaf in time deals with the danger of internalised patterns of behaviour and their impact on nature. here, continuous growth and time are juxtaposed, which raises the question of finitude.

with joëlle bischof

the objective is not to deny a sentence its complexity, but rather to dismantle and reconstruct it, progressing while also reading it in reverse, with full acknowledgment that each fragment of information is bound to a specific time and place. then everything goes - no further - no further back.

with joëlle bischof

in this thought experiment, one fork is missing, but there are five wrong ones to really get to the bottom of the underlying reasoning. therefore, the question arises as to which problem is solved by digitization and which challenges it creates in its own right. a question that may not be asked if the aim is to minimise our own mental work. but this is precisely why this work uses digital technologies to highlight thought models and orientation patterns and, for once, not sweep problems under the carpet.

the dining philosophers poem refers to the phenomenon of concurrency in informatics, which is known as "the dining philosophers problem".

while waiting is often perceived as a psychological discomfort, the body accommodates itself to patience or rather impatience. in many cultures tea serves as a crucial focal point to create a moment of tranquility. however, in performance-orientated societies, concepts emerge that aim to make even moments of rest as efficient as possible. hence, the transformation of the teabag's state is sinking in this bustling environment.

länge x lange deals with the experience of time as a mental and physical experience.

looking at misunderstandings in more detail, they have a complex life of their own. they do not only arise when different perspectives come together, but already during the communication channel.

especially digital communication channels influence conversations through their strong individual character. this is revealed even before a message reaches the digital interspace: we formulate what we want to say according to certain patterns that we have socially agreed upon. for example, almost no email begins without a more or less well thought-out opening that can subtly predefine the relationship between the dialogue partners. email is just one of many channels with their own characteristics that we use differently.

digitalisation primarily means putting something into a form that a computer can process. although user interfaces are really just interfaces. what we speak into a microphone is deconstructed into a binary code and then reconstructed as an acoustic event as soon as we play it back. on this long journey from sender to receiver, many deviations can arise that manifest themselves as traces of digitalisation.

lütolf's installation response: a bill - e.t. plays with these deviations through the technical attempt to convert the words spoken by the audience into text. it becomes literally readable how what is expressed can differ from what is received and all visitors are invited to experiment.

in contrast to many other surfaces, liquid ones are rather rare, but very unique. a wonder that something that varies so intensely can be described as a surface at all. after all, it is just a word for a phenomenon that surrounds us in our everyday lives. we live with them, but never without them. this applies to surfaces in general, but especially to the digital ones.

the sociologist armin nassehi deals in his book "patterns: theory of digital society" with the question for which problem digitalisation is a solution. the answer may not be particularly simple, but it is clear that digitalisation satisfies social needs, such as order and structure. to skip an important point here, which is that solving one problem can create a new one: digital surfaces are the portal to a complex world, but on closer inspection it becomes increasingly unclear where it begins and where it ends.

maybe patience is only the absence of expectation.

bar therapy deals with the interplay between waiting and expecting in that on the one hand there are different levels of waiting, but others only come into being through movement in the space. thus, the temporal course of the depicted loading situation is determined by the patience of the audience.

but why so patient? while the audience waits, they read short word sequences that together form a convolute of quotations, reflections and steep theses that have arisen in waiting situations, so that these mutually independent experiential values meet in a common space and at the same time call up memories. a small attempt to romanticise waiting.

with joëlle bischof

the more there is behind an idea, the less of it is visible.

an impression as a pretext to exhibit privacy exactly where one least expects it - namely as an image of oneself. does one curtain printed on a curtain make two curtains?

next to the curtain is the back wall, which is reluctant to let you look behind it. you approach it from the front, but actually everything happens behind its back.

that the front and the back wall have the same use becomes apparent when the urge to look behind the scenes fades.

opening performance: afrim fetinci
photo one: livio baumgartner

with relation / ship, connections between space and the individual are investigated and these findings are recorded in their fleetingness, reproduced, shifted and reassembled.

in the process, the installation reveals itself as a carrier of information and questions itself as a work of art by determining an aesthetic framework but making the final product dependent on the audience. the question of the extent to which spatial sensation and condition are interrelated arises.

with joëlle bischof

the most important week in the arts is for everyone. it doesn't matter where you're from, the main thing is that you've travelled as far and as effectively as possible. welcome to art basel.

with this link you can experience the performance special guess. in the leading role: the art world's favourite fruit, which is influenced by the voices of the art basel clientele.

in concrete terms, this means that an auditory livestream of the crowd at art basel is transmitted directly into the wwmm container, which for once is even more inaccessible to the public than art basel itself. all the more transparent, however, is the live broadcast of the banana, which is constantly soundtracked by the sound of switzerland's most important art fair. the reactions of the banana will show the population what influence the fair has on them. we are curious.

with joëlle bischof

the work neon tales reflects the operating principles between the individual, society and the economy and creates connections within them.

with joëlle bischof

the question of perspective arises the more undefined the points of reference are. two cameras are enough to significantly irritate spatial and temporal perception and to confront the self with other versions of itself. the image reflected on the monitors represents a video feedback that throws itself back in a temporally shifted manner.

robin lütolf addresses the concept of interpretation as a central point of translation culture. the generative image and sound installation "eine studie laut poesie" is based on an animated letter score that is interpreted and intoned by four trained singers.

zwischenergebnis einer studie mit sänger:innen zum thema phonetische poesie im fach aktuelle musik. mit den stimmen von ambra biaggi, moritz kaspar, marie-flo burki und jessica manga.

with joëlle bischof

a model railway with an action camera attached revolves in the room. this transmits the video footage live to a monitor that is visible from the store window (from the outside). the scenery is accessible to visitors and shapes the inside and outside, between observing and being observed. the game of perspective and the search for the "who" begins.

with jonas frey

through their performance, robin lütolf and jonas frey reconfigure existing spaces and question the walls that define them. by continuously adapting their voices, rhythms and gestures to one another, they create a shared ground for communication on a more abstract level.

the work is based on a fragmentary script, while large parts of the piece remain improvised. it takes up layered topics and moods and connects them into a shifting network of meanings without submitting to conventional forms of order. there is no ready-made narrative designed for entertainment; instead, the piece requires active attention and cooperation. whenever a narrative thread begins to emerge, frey and lütolf follow another tangent, revealing the strange logic that holds a conversation together.

different layers of meaning unfold from texts by jonas frey. yet even literal repetition cannot repeat something that depends on time and on a counterpart. robin lütolf responds to the spoken word in writing, manipulates what is being said through electronic tools, and continues to transform it until it becomes unclear who is asking, who is answering, who remains silent and who is speaking.

text: joëlle bischof

the aesthetics of expediency come to the fore, and with it the mood and the question of convention and tradition before and during the concert situation.

by recording and manipulating the acoustic environment in the concert hall, a soundscape is created that summarizes what has just been experienced from a new perspective. the audience is not only confronted with themselves, but also with their surroundings and the entire reorganisation situation between the concerts. the performing person wears a subtle radio link microphone and is involved in various stage technology tasks and mingles with the audience.

with fiona cavegn, niramy pathmanathan, and claudius leopold

four wandering performers enter into a subtle interaction with the alpentöne audience: the artists react with musical elements to the gestures and actions of the audience and trigger small rule changes. they explore the spatial and cultural atmosphere of altdorf and use body, voice and language to present their findings.

text: alpentöne festival

the video installation is an experiment that aims to bring the audience into a situation in which they observe the people waiting on the screen and thus put themselves into expectation.

with joëlle bischof

with the work neonschwarm, they reflect on the function of microorganisms and categorise them between the individual, society and the economy. the work is characterised by previous processes and a feeling, not for the presence of lost things, but for those that are absent.

z o o m as a vanishing point of information.

when zooming, a lot is hidden to make the usually invisible visible. the work relates to the ambivalence between the supply overload and the thirst for knowledge. it is an attempt to aesthetically investigate the collected informations and thereby gain new insights. z o o m is less a work of art than a documentary of a time when zooming was a central issue.

partial / vertical is an environment that alienates the trivial through order. the work questions the term of statics by allowing consistency and arrangement to enter into a dialogue.

to create a new way of communicating between you and an object, i tear it out of its trivial context and put it into a state that is unusable for you.

high!

i am

a light

bulb, mostly

i am

useless

but i can

afford it