This is me inside the ‘code bunker’. The installation was designed by Marjolijn Ruyg for the Rollercoaster exhibition that opened in the Breda Museum of the Image (NL) on April 29 and runs till September 2, 2012. Writer Joost Zwagerman and MOTI director Mieke Gerritzen invited me to submit an image “that defines the 21 century.” The museum changed its emphasis last December from ‘graphic design’ to ‘visual culture’. I immediately thought of invisible digital code that connects all image production these days. Out of the 121 contributions a few were similar like mine (rise of iPad and tablets, crisis of the newspapers, arrival of the digital camera etc.). I submitted the binary code of a (digital) picture of mine and wrote a paragraph about the status of digital image, asking why the human eye is slightly conservative, unable to read the digital nature of contemporary image production. All the comments are included in the exhibit and put next to the image. It is a real reading exhibit (but a nice one, I have to say). I was honored with an entire box covered with code, the machine language, which is not addressed to us. Will our ignorance towards code change anytime soon? The nice thing about the ‘code box’ was the fact that there were images on display on the outside, so when you step in you are literary taking a look at the inside of the image. Thanks Marjolijn, Joost, Mieke and the MOTI team!
PS. The exhibition is not in English and has a real focus on Dutch media celebrities. The abundance of Dutch themes such as Islam, the murder of Pim Fortuyn and Theo van Gogh could be read an attempt open a dialogue with the Dutch mainstream media that are self-obsessed who was on TV last night and what ‘quality’ newspapers highlighted. Because of the current conservative climate in this country and severe budget cuts in cultures, critical and innovative initiatives such as MOTI are forced to prostitute themselves in this way and narrow down their focus to the ‘old media’ agenda and national and regional issues. Closing of the Dutch mind? You decide. Like always, the MOTI exhibition is a must see!
