New Viewings #47

What is happening out there in the face of an outsized threat and the social and political reaction somewhere between ignorance, repression and pessimism on the one hand, and activism that is either smiled at or criminalised on the other?

Can we respond with great creative freedom and imagination? Can we develop experimental communicative formats that act between the fronts and mediate, activate and shake things up?

All works in this show were created at the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam, during a design-research seminar addressing one of the greatest communicative and artistic challenges of our time: the climate crisis. Somewhere between society, politics, science and activism there seems to be a huge blank space which we wanted to explore, understand and play on. To quote the Center for Political Beauty: „This battle won’t be won with hashtags, fairy lights, and online petitions, but with imagination.“

Torsten Lesszinsky

BLISSFUL BLINDNESS
Jula Bellmann

„It is the attempt to make tangible the constant confrontation and also deadening with the climate crisis and its consequences. Looking away, ignorance, distraction. For a short time it feels good – blissful. But the crisis and its consequences are there, like a background noise. Between hope and helplessness, rising temperatures and environmental catastrophes, apathy spreads. Does what I do bring anything at all? Am I just lazy and tell myself all this so that I don’t have to have a guilty conscience? An inner conflict that turns into an ugly grimace. But what does it all matter? The sky is bright blue, it doesn’t really affect me. Life is good.“

TIME FOR CHANGE – CLIMATE INITIATIVE
Annalu Grunwald
„The network of […] banknotes that are passed from hand to hand cannot be eliminated just like that – nor can political opposition.“ (Corinne Gisel) Banknotes are an important part of our social network, which we call commerce. They permeate all layers of society, are in permanent circulation. Banknotes are not ignored, they are not thrown away, in the rarest cases they are destroyed. So what medium is better suited for transporting important, social messages?“

GESCHLOSSENE GESELLSCHAFT
Fiete Prüfer
„60-minute auditory illustration of the climate crisis from the year 1800 to the year 2100. One second is equal to one month; one minute is equal to five years; 20 minutes is equal to one century, and so on. A worst-case scenario is assumed. The title is an allusion to the play of the same name by Sartre.“

KÖRPER, KLIMA, KALORIEN, KRISE
Mathilda Fee Sánchez
„I think I should save the world and I think I should look good doing it. I think you’d better take your hand off my thigh and I think I’d better stay quiet, don’t want to put you in an awkward situation. I think your dick must be very small for you to shamelessly honk after me from your Porsche, and I immediately think of all those sweet moments with Deutsche Bahn when doing something good for the environment always meant a personal loss. I think the climate crisis also has something to do with the patriarchy and then I think, you’re thinking to yourself now: has she gone completely nuts?! I think way too much and then I start drawing. Yes I think that’s how this work came about here.“