Artist: DIS (with Darren Bader, Will Benedict, Steffen Jørgensen, Casey Jane Ellison, Ilana Harris-Babou, Jacob Hurwitz-Goodman, Daniel Keller, Ian Isiah, Kim Laughton, Anastasia Davydova Lewis, Eno Swinnen, Chus Martínez, Ada O’Higgins, Babak Radboy, Christopher Kulendran Thomas, Annika Kuhlmann, Lance Tooks, Ryan Trecartin, Amalia Ulman, McKenzie Wark, Maroon World, Malte Zande)
Exhibition title: Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network
Venue: La Casa Encendida, Madrid, Spain
Date: February 2 – May 13, 2018
Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artists, La Casa Encendida, Madrid and the respective copyright holders
Note: Exhibition booklet can be found here
La Casa Encendida presents the exhibition Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, a guide for this brave new world that helps us understand how to be and how to view our own bodies and societies in the techno-capitalist context.
A project by DIS with Darren Bader, Will Benedict and Steffen Jørgensen, Casey Jane Ellison, Ilana Harris-Babou, Jacob Hurwitz-Goodman and Daniel Keller, Ian Isiah, Kim Laughton, Anastasia Davydova Lewis in collaboration with Eno Swinnen, Chus Martínez, Ada O’Higgins, Babak Radboy, Christopher Kulendran Thomas in collaboration with Annika Kuhlmann, Lance Tooks, Ryan Trecartin, Amalia Ulman, McKenzie Wark, Maroon World and Malte Zander.
A New York-based collective comprising Lauren Boyle, Solomon Chase, Marco Roso and David Toro, DIS works across a wide range of formats and has recently switched platforms, transitioning from an online magazine to a video-streaming edutainment channel at dis.art.
It seems like we’ve lost our minds: but who needs a brain when we’ve got thumbs that can type and swipe across screens, seeking knowledge in a sea of online information too vast for the human mind to take in?
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network reflects this important new stage for the collective: the launch of a video network that hybridises art education and entertainment, mobilising an intergenerational network around the critical issues we face today and will face tomorrow.
The collaborative output of an international group of writers, innovators and artists is presented in three immersive installations: The Restaurant, a cooking show with political themes by Will Benedict and Steffen Jørgensen; MAD, a debate programme on mothers and daughters by Casey Jane Ellison; McKenzie Wark’s zany lecture on Paul Preciado; an episode of Circle Time in which certain complex issues are explained to children; and a documentary short on seasteading (homesteading at sea) in Tahiti by Jacob Hurwitz Goodman and Daniel Keller. Ilana Harris-Babou presents Reparation Hardware, a tutorial about restoring furniture that also proposes making reparations to African-Americans, while Christopher Kulendran Thomas proposes a world where citizenship is erased by cloud technology. Maroon World and the economist Moritz Schularick disentangle the economic aspects of property ownership and inequality.
The transitional broadcasts devised by Darren Bader, Anastasia Davydova Lewis, Ryan Trecartin, Kim Laughton, Amalia Ulman, Malte Zander and DIS will link the different shows together, while “Chus” the announcer—created with Culture Sport, interpreted by Ian Isiah and inspired by Chus Martínez—jokes about the future of learning and the conservative nature of art.
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, straddling various cultural genres, is a guide for this brave new world that helps us understand how to be and how to view our own bodies and societies in the techno-capitalist context.
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, 2018, exhibition view, La Casa Encendida, Madrid
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, 2018, exhibition view, La Casa Encendida, Madrid
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, 2018, exhibition view, La Casa Encendida, Madrid
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, 2018, exhibition view, La Casa Encendida, Madrid
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, 2018, exhibition view, La Casa Encendida, Madrid
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, 2018, exhibition view, La Casa Encendida, Madrid
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, 2018, exhibition view, La Casa Encendida, Madrid
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, 2018, exhibition view, La Casa Encendida, Madrid
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, 2018, exhibition view, La Casa Encendida, Madrid
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, 2018, exhibition view, La Casa Encendida, Madrid
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, 2018, exhibition view, La Casa Encendida, Madrid
Thumbs That Type and Swipe: The DIS Edutainment Network, 2018, exhibition view, La Casa Encendida, Madrid
General Intellects with McKenzie Wark by DIS
General Intellects with McKenzie Wark by DIS
Chus Avatar by DIS
The Restaurant by Will Benedict and Steffen Jørgensen
General Intellects with McKenzie Wark by DIS
The Seavangelist by Jacob Hurwitz Goodman and Daniel Keller
What is an Egg? By Darren Bader
MAD with Casey Jane Ellison: Mothers and Daughters
The Restaurant by Will Benedict and Steffen Jørgensen
The Couch with Ada O’Higgins by DIS
Eulogy for a Black Mass by Aria Dean