The Work of Hito Steyerl

Exhibition view: Power Plants, Serpentine Galleries, London, 2019. Serpentine Galleries AR application design by Ayham Ghraowi, developed by Ivaylo Getov, Luxloop⁣⠀
Photo © 2019 readsreads.info⁣⠀

Hito Steyerl’s new project for the Serpentine Galleries considers power and inequality in society, mapping unequal wealth distribution in the communities surrounding the Serpentine which has been recorded as one of the most socially uneven areas in Europe. Power Plants will see an augmented reality app designed to expand our social vision of some local communities to reveal what Steyerl calls Actual Reality, a series of guided neighbourhood ‘power walks’, and a new video installation created using artificial intelligence trained to predict the future. 

Beginning with the premise that "power’" is the necessary condition for any digital technology’, Steyerl considers the multiple meanings of the word, including electrical currents, the ecological powers of plants or natural elements, and the complex networks of authority that shape our environments.

Hito Steyerl, How Not to Be Seen: A Fucking Didactic Educational .MOV File, 2013⁣, single channel high definition digital video and sound in architectural environment

Duration: 15:52 min

Film still © Hito Steyerl⁣

Hito Steyerl in conversation with Marius Babias⁣

Steyerl’s artistic discourse orbits sociopolitical processes in theory and practice: postcolonial criticism, abuse of power, violence and the influences of globalization and digital life visualized in five mixed media installations. ⁣
⁣
This year’s Käthe Kollwitz Prize winner responds by assembling and disassembling computer generated and real images as well as self-written texts. An artist talk will be held together with Marius Babias on 9 Apr 2019.⁣
⁣
The talk will be held in German and tickets can be purchased here.