In the east wing of Viborg Kunsthal, Stine Deja presents her solo exhibition Micro Management. A total installation that explores human existence in a world characterised by extreme natural conditions and hyper technology.
The exhibition takes its starting point in an uncanny laboratory, where the extremophile tardigrade, a microscopic creature known for its ability to survive in the most hostile conditions, becomes the focal point for a reflection on the limits of life and humanity’s quest for immortality.
Deja’s works move between science and fiction, drawing threads from ancient myths about eternal life to today’s experiments with cryonics, genetic modification and stem cell research. The installation explores the idea of a hybrid between humans and tardigrades, a vision that is not far from reality, as scientists are already experimenting with tardigrade genes in human cells. This speculative future becomes concrete in the exhibition through a monumental human-tardigrade hybrid, which can be experienced from both ground and first floor. Incubators with tardigrade eggs reinforce the feeling of being in the middle of a scientific experiment where the boundaries between life and technology are dissolving.
Micro Management focuses on humanity’s dream of overcoming death and the ethical and existential questions that arise when science challenges the boundaries of biology. What happens when we try to optimise life to the extreme? And how does this pursuit affect our understanding of what it means to be human?
Using installation, sculpture, sound and video, Stine Deja creates an uncanny universe where tardigrades form the basis for reflections on immortality, technology and humanity’s transgression of biological boundaries. The exhibition invites the audience to reflect on a future that feels both distant and close. A future where the fragility of life and the boundlessness of technology meet in a new form of existence.
