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Oli SorensonSewers / Égouts2021
2021
About the Item
Building on a series of exhibitions titled Panorama of the Anthropocene which examined the ecological impact of human activity through an array of paintings, digital prints and videos, Oli Sorenson’s Capitalocene? turns to the economic system that underlies this era. Where Anthropocene names a geological epoch defined by human activity, Capitalocene disputes the former term’s homogenization of humanity within a single category, refuting its equal attribution of responsibility for the impacts of an economic system predicated on unequal distribution of power. Capitalocene? ponders instead on a much smaller subset of humanity: the so-called 1%, whose choices and lifestyles drive anthropogenic climate change and who are nonetheless largely sheltered from its impacts. Avoiding didacticism in favour of critical engagement, Sorenson’s framing of the term as a question invites viewers to reflect on responsibility and complicity for themselves, and to find answers in their own terms.
A digital Pop aesthetic permeates the exhibition, which features works on paper and canvas, video, and online NFTs. Neon-toned graphics evoke informational and material excess in the form of abstracted cargo ships on waterways and repeating icons of automobiles, fuel containers, shopping bags, and vaccine vials. Collectively, these images suggest the immensity of global supply chains by referencing processes of mass production, transportation, distribution, consumption, and disposal. Sorenson creatively borrows from Pop and Neo-Geometric Conceptualism, making tactical use of repetition and geometric abstraction to describe the monumental scale and impact of human economic activity under capitalism. Relentlessly bright tones echo the advertising screens of consumerist visual culture: the desire to catch and hold the eye, the failed promise of infinite material prosperity..
What at first appears as a contradiction – the inclusion of NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens) in an ecocritical exhibition – serves to open up another realm for consideration: the art world’s complicity in global capital. Conscious of the massive energy footprint of conventional NFTs, Sorenson opts to use cleanNFTs which consume an infinite fraction of energy, in comparison to those based on dominant crypto-currencies. This deliberate gesture underscores that viable alternatives are available today, in NFTs as in other economic sectors. Yet as these approaches involve less money per transaction and fewer intermediaries, Sorenson notes, ecological solutions are sidelined in the interest of profit.
Capitalocene? does not explicitly name a culprit of climate change. The exhibition does, however, convincingly illustrate how the dominant economic system of capitalism prescribes an array of human activities whose ubiquity and sustained repetition, carried out in plain sight and sanctioned by those in power, shapes life on a planetary scale to dire ends.
- Creator:Oli Sorenson
- Creation Year:2021
- Dimensions:Height: 72 in (182.88 cm)Width: 36 in (91.44 cm)
- Medium:
- Movement & Style:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:Montreal, CA
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU4769568592
Oli Sorenson’s remix art was first recognised in London, after taking part in numerous media art events at the Institute of Contemporary Art (2003-06), Tate Britain (2006), and the British Film Institute (2008-10). He also gradually established an international profile when performing at ZKM (Karlsruhe, 2002), ISEA (Helsinki, 2004), Mapping (Geneva, 2009) and Sonica Festivals (Ljubljana, 2012). After moving to Montreal in 2010, Sorenson redirected his work towards gallery based projects, and since exhibited at The Power Plant (Toronto, 2014), FILE (Sao Paulo, 2015), Monitoring (Kassel, 2017) and Art Mûr (Berlin, 2018). Sorenson consistently disrupts institutional expectations of the visual artist as a producer of proprietary images. His work exposes the contradictions between limited copyright and massively reproducible media but also asks timely questions about singular authorship in an age of overabundant networked content. Under such conditions, the making of a contemporary work of art involves more distributed processes than isolated generative acts from original authors. Beyond market pressures to produce new and exclusive art objects, lies a material culture of exchange and emulation embraced by networked societies. Sorenson aims to unsettle this prevalence of art created from scratch by promoting gestures of citation and appropriation. When he copies, transforms and combines existing works by established artists, such cultural materials are re-used and recycled not in spite of their propertied ties to private estates but rather by virtue of their belonging to a specific heritage, community and/or collective memory.
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