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KARIN FERRARI
(DECODING THE WHOLE TRUTH)
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Karin Ferrari
Brigittenauer Lände 36/24
1200 Wien
+43(0)6508404042
mail@karinferrari.com
www.karinferrari.com
Ich verwende Zeichen und Symbole aus Social
Media und Pop Kultur um unsere Gegenwart zu
untersuchen. Meine künstlerische Forschung
beschäftigt sich mit Inhalten an der Schwelle
akademischer Theorie, (politischer) Paranoia
und fantastischer Erzählung. Die Grauzone
zwischen Fakten und Fiktion bietet mir als
Künstlerin einen Einblick in alternative Denkformen und Weltanschauungen. Meine Serie
DECODING (THE WHOLE TRUTH) deckt versteckte
Botschaften in Musikvideos und T V Clips auf.
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Exhibition view Auratic and Other Phenomena curated by Erich Hable, Galerie 5020, Salzburg, 2015
DECODING (THE WHOLE TRUTH)
Seit fünf Jahren decke ich versteckte Botschaften in Musikvideos und TV Clips in meiner Serie
DECODING (THE WHOLE TRUTH) auf. Die Interpretationen füge ich anhand von Zwischen-
titeln, Voice-over und Animationen in das Originalvideo ein. Die Videos der Serie DECODING
(THE WHOLE TRUTH) wurden international gezeigt: im Blickle Kino im 21er Haus - Museum für
zeitgenössische Kunst in Wien, bei der V Moscow International Biennale for Young Art, im Royal
Military Museum in Brüssel, bei der Satellite Art Show in Miami, während des Papay Gyro Nights
Festivals in Hong Kong und in einigen österreichischen Galerien. Das neueste Video DECODING
Die Intros der ZiB (THE WHOLE TRUTH) ist im Rahmen der Pixel, Bytes & Film Artist in Residence für ORF III entstanden.
Die Idee zur Serie DECODING (THE WHOLE TRUTH) beruht auf einer Sorte YouTube Videos,
die sich im Schwellenbereich von akademischer Theorie, politischer Paranoia und Science Fiction
bewegen. Diese Videos sind ein Ausdruck des Bestreben die opaken Machtstrukturen unserer
Gegenwart zu verstehen. Diese Suche nach der ganzen Wahrheit ist vergleichbar mit Detektiv-
arbeit. Dabei kommt es vor, dass der investigative Eifer kippt und obsessive Fantasien zu erkennen gibt. Bezeichnend für meine künstlerische Arbeit ist, dass sie sich, statt kritischen Abstand zu
wahren und distanziert ästhetisch zu reflektieren, diese mediale Plattform und dessen Produkt
aneignet. Eine Auswahl meiner DECODING Videos ist auf YouTube öffentlich gelistet und wird rege
konsumiert und kommentiert. Ich belasse es in meiner Analyse nicht bei einzelnen Verdachtsmomenten. Vielmehr stülpe ich dem gesamten untersuchten Filmmaterial eine logisch nachvollziehbare
Parallelerzählung über. Dabei nehme ich Bezug auf aktuelle Themen zeitgenössischer Strömungen
von Philosophie, Literatur (Theory Fiction, New Weird) und Kulturtheorie verbinde sie mit Popkultur,
(politischer) Paranoia, fringe theories und Science Fiction. Entscheidend ist dabei der Wahrheits-
anspruch (the wohle truth) und das Motiv einer alternativen Realität, an deren Existenz kein
Zweifel besteht.
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DECODING Die Intros der ZiB
(THE WHOLE TRUTH)
Der Kurzfilm DECODING Die Intros der ZiB (THE WHOLE TRUTH) von Karin Ferrari deckt versteckte Botschaften in den Signaturen der Nachrichtensendung Zeit im Bild auf. Es stellt sich
heraus, dass diesen alltäglichen Fernsehbildern ein Surplus an Bedeutung eingeschrieben ist,
welches trotz ihrer Präsenz weitgehend unerkannt bleibt. DECODING Die Intros der ZiB (THE
WHOLE TRUTH) ist inspiriert von einer Sorte YouTube-Videos, die sich im Schwellenbereich von
akademischer Theorie, politischer Paranoia und Science Fiction bewegen. DECODING Die Intros
der ZiB (THE WHOLE TRUTH) ist im Rahmen der ORF Artist in Residence Pixel Bytes & Film
entstanden und ist Teil Ferraris Webserie DECODING (THE WHOLE TRUTH) in der versteckte
Botschaften in Musikvideos und TV-Clips aufgedeckt werden.
(...) kommt es so nicht nur zu einem Bedeutungsüberschuss, zu einer Verselbständigung der
Bedeutungsströme und zur Verunsicherung eines stabil angenommenen Systems. Wenn Fer-
rari bei den DECODING Videos im Untertitel die ganze Wahrheit verspricht, ist dies nicht mehr
als der Hinweis auf ihren Rezeptionszusammenhang, in dem die Videos und ihre überbordende
Symbolik sofort mit krausen Weltverschwörungstheorien in Verbindung gebracht worden sind.
Claudia Slanar, Kuratorin Blickle Stiftung 21er Haus
21er Haus - Museum für zeitgenössische Kunst, Wien
Experimentelle Docu-fiction, 30 min, 2016
Screenings: ORF III, Framout Festival Museumsquartier Wien,
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Künstlerhaus Büchsenhausen, Innsbruck
A: Der nun folgende Bericht zeigt, wie das Intro der Fernsehnachrichtensendung Zeit im Bild die
eigene Zeit in ein Bild fasst: also Gegenwart visuell erfahrbar macht. Das ZIB-Intro erzeugt die
Fiktion einer gemeinsamen Gegenwart – was übrigens „die eigentliche Aufgabe zeitgenössischer
Kunst ist“, so der Kulturtheoretiker Peter Osborne.
B: Alle Aufnahmen der Erde, die in den ZiB-Intros der letzten 60 Jahre vorkommen, sind Simula-
tionen. Sie sind computergeneriert und damit genauso fiktiv wie das Weltbild, das sie zeichnen.
Sie zeichnen ein einheitliches Weltbild, das – von Störgeräuschen befreit und geglättet – erschaffen wurde, um das Chaos zu bekämpfen.
A: Der Kampf gegen das Chaos wird auf der Ebene der symbolischen Bedeutung und der
Repräsentation geführt. Die Zeichen und Bilder, die dafür benutzt werden, sind magisch. Denn
nach der Definition von CCRU, der Cybernetic Culture Research Unit, ist Magie der Einsatz von
Zeichen mit dem Ziel, Veränderungen der Realität herbeizuführen.
B: Dabei muss man sich fragen, wie wird eine solche magische Wirkung der Bilder ermöglicht?
Das Intro der Nachrichtensendung schafft eben diese Voraussetzung für eine magische Wirkung
dieser Bilder, indem es Autorität, Authentizität und Aktualität signalisiert. Die komplexen und opa-
ken Machtstrukturen unserer Gegenwart werden symbolisch codiert reproduziert und so wirksam
in den Köpfen der Zusehenden verankert.
B: Im Folgenden werden wir die Intros der ZiB der letzten 60 Jahre decodieren..
Auszug des Sprechtextes und Stills aus DECODING Die Intros der ZiB (THE WHOLE TURTH)
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DECODING Azealia Banks’ Atlantis
(THE WHOLE TRUTH)
Das Video Atlantis von Azealia Banks zeigt wie die geologische Geschichte der Erde und Entstehung und Kollaps des modernen Kapitalismus ein traumatisches Megasystem bilden.
29:00 min, 2013/2015
Die Musikerin Azealia Banks hat meine Analyse ihres Videos gefunden und darüber getwittert.
Ihren Tweet habe ich als Objekt produziert.
Stills DECODING Azealia Banks’ Atlantis (THE WHOLE TRUTH)
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AZEALIA’S TWEET 40 x 40 x 2 cm, PVC, Ausstellungsansicht Bar du Bois, Philippe Gerlach (c) 2015
PERPETUATING THE MYTH OF UNIVERSAL SUCCESS
Die Installation PERPETUATING THE MYTH OF
UNIVERSAL SUCCESS für die Ausstellung Mehr
als Worte. Zeichen. Symbol. Sinnbilder. (kuratiert
von Karl Berger) im Foyer des Museums Tiroler
Volkskunst bestand aus einem 50 m langen roten
Teppich und einer Logowand. Der rote Teppich
schien durch die verglaste Wand in den Kreuz-
gang hindurchzugehen. Die Logowand simulierte
eine Imagekampagne, welche die Künstlerin Karin Ferrari sowie Förderer des Museums beworb.
Zur der Eröffnung der Ausstellung fand die Performance SUBLIMINAL MESS statt, bei der die
Künstlerin als Fotografin getarnt die BesucherIn-
nen vor der Logowand fotografierte. Die Fotos
wurden auf Social Media veröffentlicht.
Das Screening des Films DECODING Katy Per-
ry’s Dark Horse (THE WHOLE TRUTH) fand im
Kloster, auf dem roten Teppich statt. Ein roter Teppich und der Starmythos sind zentrale Elemente
meiner Analyse des Musikvideos Dark Horse.
Ausstellungsansichten
Volkskunstmuseum Innsbruck 2015
DECODING Katy Perry’s Dark Horse
(THE WHOLE TRUTH)
The rhetorical form of DECODING Katy Perry’s Dark Horse (THE WHOLE TRUTH) by Karin
Ferrari, is clearly inspired by a rich vein of independent documentaries on YouTube wich purport
to uncover or correctly analyze the symbolic manifestations of major conspiracies in our public
life. Set in Memphis - Egypt - and suffused with hieroglyphic imagery, an ultra light pop-music
video by the eponymous American star receives a dogged, and deadpan, analysis in a voiceover
supplied by the artist. Like the underground media whose idioms it highlights, Ferrari’s argument
is by turns weirdly convincing and highly implausible.
en, 20:00 min, 2015/2016
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Nadim Samman, Kurator Moscow Biennale for Young Art
Stills aus DECODING Katy Perry’s Dark Horse (THE WHOLE TURTH)
DECODING Lady Gaga’s Bad
Romance (THE WHOLE TRUTH)
Meiner Interpretation zufolge handelt das Video Bad Romance von Lady Gaga von ihrer okkulten
Initiation zum Popstar. Deutlich wird dies u.a. dadurch, dass sie auf einer symbolischen Ebene
des Videos zur Sonne wird. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20x93d0Ghdg
21:00 min, 2011/2015
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I published all the user comments on YouTube about my video DECODING Lady Gaga’s Bad
Romance (THE WHOLE TRUTH) as screenshot images in the book Epidemic Subjects - Radical
Ontologies, Elisabeth von Samsonow (ed.) Contributions by Aran Arantzazu Arregi, Johanna
Braun, Levi Bryant, Francesca Coin, Karin Ferrari, Boyan Manchev, Angela Melitopoulos, Suzana
Milevska, Elisabeth von Samsonow and Susan Stryker.
The University of Chicago Press for Diaphenes, 192 pages, 2016
DECODING Reuter’s Buisness
as usual for Siemens in Russia
(THE WHOLE TRUTH)
DECODING Business as usual for Siemens in Russia (THE WHOLE TRUTH) video stills, 6 min, 2014
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THE WHOLE TRUTH DISKO
a live DJ & VJ performance with videos from the weird part of YouTube
to create a live visual & sonic mashup (hyper-image).
The current information revolution requests a competent use of media. Many people use
alternative media on the internet. Conspiracy theories thrive. Why mistrust? Cases where
the public was excluded, lied to and manipulated are many. Covert warfare, secret armys
and state terrorism are historically proven. A battle for the public opinion is going on.
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Poster and performance THE WHOLE TRUTH DISKO
at The War Party (curated by Willem Vermeersch), Royal Military Museum Brussels, 2016
HYPERCONNECTED (THE WHOLE PICTURE)
Eine skalierbare Vektorkarte, welche die semantischen Zusammenhänge
zwischen einer Gruppe Interneticons visualisiert.
In den visuellen Codes allgegenwärtiger Computer-Interfaces scheint ein subversives symbolisches
Potential zu stecken. Diese Dimension will erkannt und untersucht, ihre magische transformative
Kraft zur Entfaltung gebracht werden. Ist das Wireless-Symbol das Gegenstück zum Allsehenden
Auge? Oder haben wir uns einfach schon im ständigen Überschuss symbolischer Bedeutung ver-
fangen? Karin Ferrari zeichnet mit Hyperconnected (The Whole Picture) eine spekulative Karte
der Flüsse symbolischer Bedeutungen, die einen Cluster von Internet-Piktogrammen miteinander
verbindet. Sie kartiert die ominösen Tiefenströmungen, die durch planetare Kommunikationsnetzwerke und archaische Machtstrukturen fließen. Durch die Aneignung und bildhafte Re-Präsentation mimetischer Zeichen und ihrer syntaktischen Kopplungen entstehen neue Möglichkeiten in
Technicolor: Next time you touch a WiFi symbol, a different kind of connection might be established.
Palais des Beaux Arts
Rudolf-von-Alt-Platz, 1030 Vienna
26.5.–15.07.2016
kuratiert von Bernhard Garnicnic
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Bookpresentations
Karin Ferrari
COLORING BOOK. Occult Symbolism in Popculture
Simple motifs to color based on common forms of imagery in corporate logos, music videos and
entertainment industry that a growing internet community associateas with a hidden agenda.
40 pages, english 10 Euro
available at 21er Haus - Museum for Contemporary Art, Salon für Kunstbuch,
Salon für Kunstbuch Mondscheingasse 11, 1070 Wien
Bedroom Culture (created by Johanna Braun) at The Satellite Show, Miami Beach, FL, 2015
Magnificient Seven (kuratiert von Martin Hanni und Lisa Trockner) Galerie Prisma, Bozen, 2016
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KARIN FERRARI
BOOK
COLORING
OCCULT SYMBOLISM IN POP CULTURE
The chameleon is based on the transparent lizard on
a poster designed by David Darchicourt that was redrawn
for the catalogue “Simon Denny, Secret Power”, 2015
Is monarch programming just a fantasy of a bunch of
male nerds about powerful women who are mind-controlled
sexbots or is it about the systematical conditioning
of mankind? Mariah Carey, Breakdown, 1997 (1:30)
The sphinx cat represents post-ideological lifestyle
feminism. Lady Gaga, “Bad Romance”, 2009 (2:43)
Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi and the game of decadence.
Karin Ferrari, “DECODING Katy Perry’s ‘Dark Horse’
(THE WHOLE TRUTH)”, 2015 (13:18)
SOCIAL SCIENCE
SIMPLE MOTIFS TO COLOR BASED ON COMMON FORMS OF IMAGERY IN
CORPORATE LOGOS, MUSIC VIDEOS AND ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRY
THAT A GROWING INTERNET COMMUNITY ASSOCIATES WITH A
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OCCULT SYMBOLISM IN POP CULTURE
COLORING BOOK
KARIN FERRARI
Symbols, in whatever form they appear, are not usually
isolated; they appear in clusters, giving rise to symbolic
compositions, which may be evolved in time (as in the case
of story telling), in space (works of art, emblems, graphic
designs), or in both space and time (dreams, drama).
J.E. Cirlot, A dictionary of symbols, 1971
In place of aura, there is buzz. Like a swarm of bees,
a swarm of images makes a buzz, and like a new idea or
trend, once an image (whether attached to a product,
a policy, a person, or a work of art) achieves saturation, it
has a “buzz”.
David Joselit, After Art, 2013
Karin Ferrari interviewed by Rahma Khazam
"A theory of cause and effect shows you how the trick is done. But what if something crucial about causality resided at the level of the magic trick itself ? "
Timothy Morton, Realist Magic: Objects, Ontology, Causality (2013, p. 17)
Karin Ferrari is an artist based in Vienna, Austria who explores occult
symbolism in pop culture, the entertainment industry and social media. She
is known for her web series DECODING (THE WHOLE TRUTH), in which she
reveals hidden messages in music videos and TV clips. She has exhibited her
work internationally: at Amsterdam Drawing, at the Royal Military Museums in
Brussels, at the 21er Haus - Museum for Contemporary Art and Blickle Kino in
Vienna, in a number of Austrian galleries and on Austrian television. Art historian and critic Rahma Khazam talks with her about magic, conspiracy theories
and Hyperstition.
RK: Over the past five years, you've been analyzing the symbolism in music
videos. You integrate your analyses in the original videos in the form of voiceovers, intertitles or text inserts. Now you've produced a colouring book containing cartoon-style symbols accompanied by short texts. What prompted you to
adopt this new format ?
KF: In his exhibition at the 2015 Venice Biennial, Simon Denny presented a
series of Cryptokids cartoon characters by the graphic designer David
Darchicourt, who was the NSA's Creative Director up until 2012. On the NSA
website, you can download and print out coloring pages with these NSA cartoons,
which are designed to educate children about the work of the agency. The idea
of the colouring book came from there. What I find interesting about children's
books is that they are didactic, they have an agenda and there's often a moral,
such as don't lie or don't steal. There are fascinating biases in these images that
seem so harmless and nice but are completely manipulative. The symbols I've
selected for my book also appear innocent but they actually refer to popular
conspiracy theories on the Internet involving secret societies, black magic and
mind control.
They all have double or triple meanings and form an extensive web of crossreferences and allusions.
Absolutely. For instance, the letters of the title on the cover form a pyramid,
with the eye of the chameleon as the capstone. The pyramid shape is a reference
to the cover of Amanda Beech's publication Final Machine (2013), which alludes
to conspiracy, power and paranoia, but it's also a key symbol in conspiracy
theory itself. The chameleon is a bridge not only to conspiracy theory, but also to
the art world and the phenomenon of mass surveillance. I'll explain why. David
Darchicourt made an NSA ‘Security’ poster featuring a translucent chameleon
and Denny commissioned Darchicourt to redraw the creature for his exhibition in Venice. That's the connection to the art world and surveillance. But you
should also bear in mind that my chameleon is based on the creature that Darchicourt redrew for the exhibition, which resembles a lizard. And the lizard recalls conspiracy theorist David Icke's claim that shape-shifting extra-terrestrial
reptilian aliens are taking on human form so that they can infiltrate the elite of
human society and take control of the planet.
When you open the book, you'll see a fairy-like figure that I've called Fortuna
Imperatrix Mundi. She symbolizes a supernatural being/Pantokrator/goddess of
luck and fate and is pictured here hovering over two dice. The dice are an allusion to the game of decadence, a fictional concept I borrowed from the Cybernetic
Culture Research Unit - and to the dice that WWII pilots hung on their rearview
mirror, to remind themselves, as I point out in the Katy Perry video, that each
flight is a game with death.
Further on, there's a drawing of Justin Bieber’s owl tattoo, which according
to Internet rumours is a reference to the Brethren of Minerva. The Brethren
formed the lower degrees of the Bavarian Illuminati, a secret society founded
in the late eighteenth century. The Illuminati were eventually disbanded, but
up until today their name keeps turning up in conspiracy theories of all kinds.
Then there's the Vodafone logo containing the number 666, which is known as
the mark of the beast or the devil's number. The official explanation is that these
numbers are quotation marks!
I apply similar analyses to the symbolism in music videos. In my analysis of the
Katy Perry video Dark Horse I point out the plethora of all-seeing eye imagery,
which harks back to the Egyptian hieroglyph "Eye of Horus" as well as to the
history of Christianity and Freemasonry. The finale of the video consists in the
appearance of a gigantic pyramidal spaceship, which according to my analysis
is a 3D incarnation of the all-seeing eye and prefigures the security apparatus of
future surveillance states. It's not that implausible: drones are already watching
us from the air.
How did you first become interested in occult symbols ?
In the mountains where I grew up, legends about witches and fairytale figures
were associated with specific places close to where I lived. I knew they were just
stories but they somehow felt real. Then as a teenager, I became intrigued by the
whole culture around occult symbolism and the paranormal and wanted to find
out more. It wasn't easy though, because in the 1990s there was no YouTube and
you'd have to go to special bookshops to buy the material. Very few people knew
about ancient aliens, the Illuminati or the theory that climate change might
cause an ice age.
Who are the writers and thinkers who inspire you ?
Is Lovecraft a big influence ?
Everyone who's interested in forbidden knowledge and the unknown quotes
Lovecraft. But for a while now, my greatest source of inspiration has been the
weird part of YouTube. “Three clicks and I’m in the weird part of YouTube again”
is the comment people post when they access the videos recommended by
YouTube’s related video function. Many videos in the weird part of YouTube are
attempts to express in visual terms the complex and opaque power structures of
the present. They tell crazy stories that claim to be true - which makes them far
more intriguing than if they were pure fiction. They get millions of clicks because
there's a huge community of people who don't believe in the official explanations
about what is going on. On the Internet, non-mainstream theories circulate very
fast and can be linked up with many other stories, rumours and conjectures.
The related video feature on YouTube is like falling through a trap door or rabbit
hole: you can't help but go deeper and deeper.
Is that why you put your videos online ? Because of the huge audience for this
type of material ?
I do it because I'm appropriating knowledge that I've found online and I want
to give it back to the community from which it came. Another reason I like
presenting my work on the Internet is because I get all kinds of comments which I regard as part of the artwork. When Azealia Banks saw the interpretation I made of her video, she tweeted: "Look guys, I'm really a witch".
What other differences are there between showing your work in a gallery and on
the Internet ?
Art is fake on many levels and what I like about the Internet is that there is no
pretense. People take the work seriously and assume that I am serious about it.
And I am serious about it. I'm not making fun of conspiracy theorists, because
regardless of whether their claims are true or not, there is a transformative
power and potential in going beyond the ordinary. Facts are limiting. I don't go to
extremes though. I maintain an objective distance in my analyses and I leave the
really crazy interpretations to the comments section of YouTube.
Your analyses aren't too far-fetched - we feel we'd like to believe them and that
there may be some truth in them. It's not like face pareidolia, people who see the
face of Jesus in a piece of toast, which seems completely absurd.
It is linked to my work though. You see what you want to see. But although I can
relate to it, it's a joke, there's no rationale to it. I work differently. I don't focus on
individual images. Like a detective, I construct a consistent and watertight narrative, in which every piece has to fit. I start with coincidences and ambiguities,
but the end result is logical and scientific.
You draw on fringe theories and ideas that have been rejected by academia, but
you make them sound authoritative. Were you influenced by Reza Negarestani's
concept of theory-fiction ?
I admire the way Reza Negarestani and Ccru used the vocabulary, the style
and the authority associated with works of theory to create a new genre between
fiction and reality. When I read Reza's book Cyclonopedia: Complicity with
Anonymous Materials (2008), I felt that it achieved what I'd been trying to do in
my video series DECODING (THE WHOLE TRUTH).
In 2013, you made a work called DECODING Azealia Banks' Atlantis (THE
WHOLE TRUTH), which explored the entanglements between the origins of the
universe and the collapse of modern capitalism. These are issues that also crop
up in the writings of Reza Negarestani and Ccru.
Yes, but I made that video before I knew about them. The connection between the
origins of the universe and capitalism is quite complex and took me some time to
work out. The original video doesn't really mean anything if you watch it without
taking my analysis into account, and once you do, it changes your perception of
reality and you can't go back to watching it as you did before. Armen Avanessian
and Anke Hennig discuss this phenomenon in their book Metanoia (2014). The
selfreflexive experience of this shift of perspective or metanoia is the effect I try
to achieve with my works - they're like exercises for loosening up rigid thought
patterns.
You talk about changing the viewer's perception of reality, but where is the limit
between fiction and what actually takes place ?
I tend to think not so much in terms of truth and fiction as in terms of synchronicity or meaningful coincidences, as Jung put it. Take my work Lucky Jokers
(2004-2010), which is an experiment about how attention can affect reality.
After witnessing a series of bizarre, inexplicable coincidences or synchronicities, I decided I would look for Jokers on the street. In the course of six years I
found 12 cards. The last finding happened in Mongolia after a bet with a friend
who didn’t believe me. A few days later we found a Joker lying in the middle of a
crossing !
There's a quote in Ccru's text "Inside the Architectonic Order of the Eschaton"
that I find especially relevant to your work: "Serious magic is too big to see. It
consists of boxes within boxes within boxes ... endless embeddings, encompassings, and concentric closings of circles, topographic correlate of summonings,
banishings, and bindings." You seem to be revealing these invisible magical
embeddings.
Magic is a important theme in my practice. You can see that in my latest DECODING video, DECODING Die Intros der ZiB (THE WHOLE TRUTH) (2016). It's an
analysis of the opening credits of the Austrian television news programme ZiB,
in which I reference Ccru's definition of magic, i.e. the use of signs to produce
changes in reality. The magical signs in the intros (the earth seen from above,
the clock, the title of the news programme) convey authenticity and authority
and warn the audience that something more real than the rest is about to come.
Bourdieu writes that words exert a magical power on those who are prepared to
believe in them and I think this can be applied to images as well.
So you use Bourdieu and Ccru to legitimize magic. What happens in the rest of
the video ?
In the first section, I introduce the philosopher Peter Osborne’s concept of the
fiction of the contemporary. I apply his concept to the intros, claiming that the
intros do exactly that: they create a fiction of the contemporary. This is because
the images of Earth are simulations pretending to be real, and the world view
on which the intros draw is fictitious in that it's unified, smooth and abstract. At
the end of the video I explode the concept of the fiction of the contemporary by
introducing the concept of Predictive Programming, which I explicitly link to the
intros of the past two years. Predictive Programming is a non-academic concept
from Internet conspiracy theories. It means for example that dystopian movies
like The Hunger Games, which portray totalitarian states, prepare the population for similar conditions in real life - because they get used to the idea and
slowly accept it.
You showed excerpts of your new video on news intros at the conference
"Hyperstition: Challenging Dominant Reality Today" (Künstlerhaus Büchsenhausen, Innsbruck, 2016), in which Armen Avanessian and Mark Fisher also
participated. Does it link up with their work ?
There are parallels with Armen Avanessian and Suhail Malik's concept of
the post-contemporary, a new time mode that supersedes ideas such as the
contemporary, the present and linear time, seen as a succession of blocks that
we pass through one after the other. Instead, it proposes a time-complex where
the future is no longer dependent on the present. The prefix 'post' in the term
post-contemporary is crucial because it does not simply mean 'after', but
'beyond'. The politics of preemptive strikes and Amazon's book recommendation
algorithm are examples of how, as Armen Avanessian puts it, the future shapes
the present and time arrives from the future. There is a reversal in the flow of
time and this is how Hyperstition works. Hyperstition is a neologism invented
by the writers’ collective Ccru, which Mark Fisher was part of. It means “fictions
that makes themselves real”. Advertising works this way. Speculation and the
finance market work this way. Something assumes worth because people predict
it will. Armen Avanessian and Suhail Malik don’t use the term Predictive
Programming but it would fit within the framework of the post-contemporary.
So there's a reversal of time, and also of causality - effects precede causes. But to
come back to your video, how do you apply Predictive Programming to the news ?
The news shapes reality because the population believes the news and adapts its
behaviour accordingly. Instead of Osborne's fiction of the contemporary, we have
Predictive Programming, which associates magic and the real. Magic without
realism and realism without magic are either silly or boring. But they form an
explosive mixture with groundbreaking properties when they're combined in
the proper way.
Dr. Rahma KHAZAM is an art critic, historian and researcher. She participates
in international conferences on art and aesthetics and has published her writing
in exhibition catalogues, thematic anthologies and contemporary art magazines
such as Frieze, Artforum.com and Springerin. Member of AICA (International
Association of Art Critics). Member of EAM (European Network for Avant-Garde
and Modernism Studies).
ARD Text, ORF TELETEXT, Swiss Text and arte Teletext present
the International Teletext Art Festival ITAF 2015. ITAF starts on
August 13th and is broadcasted for one month in ARD Text, ORF
TELETEXT and ORF III TELETEXT, Swiss Text and arte Tele-
text. It will be also part of the Ars Electronica Festival 2015 “Post
City”, in Linz/Austria, September 3rd to 7th 2015. Since it was
launched in 2012 the International Teletext Art Festival ITAF has
been enjoyed by over two million people in Germany, France,
Switzerland, Austria and Finland. The festival can be experienced in millions of private homes which makes it one of the
biggest media art events in the world. The 2015 festival is cu-
rated by Juha van Ingen from FixC cooperative, Helsinki/Finland.
(press release)
SYMBOLIC SYNTAX OF LASER
SPACE CATS AND UNICORNS
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A cross tabulation with images related to urban (hipster) subculture in the early 2010s.
These types of images where everywhere: on t-shirts, album covers, social media. The
arrangement of the images (found footage) in a cross tabulation is an attempt to visually
systematize eight selected signs (triangle, cat, cross, universe, laser, tiger, rainbow,
unicorn) and their 64 combinations. 2013, when these images were reaching their peak of
circulation I produced the poster (60 cm x 84 cm). 2015 I made an installation with images
from the cross tabulation in the windows of the gallery 5020 in Salzburg.
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Exhibtition views, installation and poster SYMBOLIC SYNTAX OF LASER SPACE CATS AND UNICORNS
Auratic and Other Phenomena, curated by Erik Hable, Galerie fünzigzwanzig , Salzburg 2015
EVOLUTION OF THE TRIANGLE
The political unit of the pyramid degenerated into the most meaningless geometric shape:
the triangle. It became the glorified object of urban middle-class subculture in the early
2010s. EVOLUTION OF THE TRIANGLE is a collection of album covers with a triangle
shaped motif. The first to be released in 1973 only a few days apart from each other were
Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd, House of the Holy by Led Zeppelin, and Tubular Bells
by Mike Oldfield. An increasing number of releases followed. (2014, work in progress.)
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Now she’s become the sun. She’s in the center of the planetary orbits.
This is a representation of the sun as astronomical object.
(Textauszug DECODNG Lady Gaga’s Bad Romance (THE WHOLE TRUTH), 2010
A group of clones turning around a 1 Euro coin. There is a connection between gold and god, both center of veneration. Our monetary
system is based on gold. The golden colored border of the 1 Euro coin echoes coins of the past, that were made of gold. The brilliance
of gold has always been associated with the sun. The coin is high in the sky like the sun. The formation the clones take is known as
sun wheel since Bronze Age. The symbols on the sides are not exactly Euro signs. The letter E looks like a combination of zero and =.
This means: money equals nothing. The video was released during the Great Recession in 2012. (Textauszug DECODNG Azealia
Banks’ Atlantis (THE WHOLE TRUTH), 2013/2015)
THE SUN IS NOT WHAT WE THINK IT IS
7 fluorescent tubes, installation at the Fluc, 150 x 150 cm, 2014
An On-Going Project curated by Ursula Maria Probst
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Karin Ferrari
The sun is a very close star
There is a connection between sun worship, conceptions of god, and modern
celebrity culture. Celebrities are even named after the sun which as an astronomical object is a star as a matter of fact. The cult of the sun evolved into
monotheism. Celebrities are worshiped like gods. The sunset represents the
decay of the superstar - an essential component of celebrity culture.
THE SUN IS A VERY CLOSE STAR
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Conceptual postcard for Bregenz Biennale (curated by Albert Allgaier), 2016
INTELLIGENT TIMELINES
Intelligent Timelines is a alternative time system depicted by diagrams and calculations: every day the sun goes down at 6 pm
worldwide. Intelligen Timelines was published in ‘World Best New
Art’, a book project in which curators of leading art museums in-
troduce fictitious projects by young artists, which are relevant for
the future development of art. The startig point is our understandig
of the earth as a system of coordinates. For Ferraris Intelligent
Timelines, our division of the eart into time zones that run vertically
is replaced by a system with time zones running horizontally. The
project is based on a scientific calculation. However the results are
shown in the form of a painting and are governed by the language
of images. According to the calculations, the solar days last 28
hours in certain areas, while in many places the sun never rises at
all. Sonja Traar, Intelligent Timelines, in: World Best New Art.
WORLD BEST NEW ART cover (ed. Georg Leutner), Verlag Für Moderne Kunst Nürnberg, 2007
INTELLIGENT TIMELINES diagrams,
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ECHO
I took photos of architecture pictures in books, using flash light. The light of the flash reflected on
the surface of the paper. I positioned it in a way that made the circle of light look like the sun.
die neue nukleare sonne leuchtet uns von der anderen seite an. ihr blaues licht leuchtet rückwärts durch die
zeit. blue shift. wie auf karin ferraris fotos. der pilger aus flammarios bild ist schon seit langem verschwunden.
zurück bleibt das half-life, die halbwelt. endlich angekommen: der schwarze block. und lässt uns in den letzten
traum erwachen. Michael Saup
O.T. 1 (based on an image of the Center of Performing Arts Manila), C-Print on Aluminium, 90 x 120 cm, 2006
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O.T. 9 (based on Buckminster Fuller’ visualization for “The Last Whole Earth Catalog” 1971), 2011
And some aliens may even be free from original sin
(quote father Funes, chief astronomer at Vatican)
acrylic on canvas, 90 x 130 cm, 2014
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WHITE DWARF
The astrophysical term White Dwarf is used for a star in its final stage,
when its highly compressed matter curves space. The concrete
sculpture White Dwarf is a piece of highway converted into a cube
whose edges find another in an imaginary way. The sculpture was
created in cooperation with an engineer who was involved in the
construction of the highway Vienna-Bratislava and has come into
the possession of the cast concrete used there. Significantly, the
Austrian section, from which the concrete was removed, was only
finalized 2006, many years after the part in the Slovak Republic.
WHITE DWARF 40 x 40 x 45 cm, ferroconcrete, 2006
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exhibition view POLE SHIFT Akademie der bildenden Künste Wien 2008
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buzz mode
ARTISTIC RESEARCH
The two fold horn
Horns as headdress in fashion
and music business.
NUIT DE WALPURGIS
Talk at V.esch, Johann Neumeister,
Karin Ferrari and Simone Carneiro
2013, Foto (c) Kerstin von Gabain
SELFPORTRAIT
Maleficient
mixed media on canvas,
90 x 150 cm, 2013
IN
INFOS DEVELOPMENT DEVIL
For several years now pop musicians and celebrities wear horns
as headdresses on red carpet events. They became a fashion
statement. ● Before the two fold horn was associated with evil,
it was simply conceived as a symbol of female power: borrowed
from the vitally important horned animals goat and cow. ● In Old
Sumer and Egypt in the course of the development of an abstract
artistic representation, the fertility and earth goddesses themselves
became the carriers of the horn.
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MESSAGE MUSICAL
Liquid Architecture
pour Earth X Other
EVERY TIME I TRAVEL TO
THE CENTER OF THE EARTH
I PUT ON SOME LIPSTICK AND MY
HORNS
(left:) Performance in
Styria, Rostfest 2013
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VOGUE WITCH, digitally altered fashion photography, 2013
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DECODING Azealia Banks’ Atlantis (THE WHOLE TRUTH), video stills, 30 min, 2013/15
SCHIZO-FLUX
Series of 6 digitally altered self portraits with masks with the form of Rorschach inkblots, 2012
Schizo-fluxes only flow on differentiated zones, meaning that there must be at least two opposite sides identity and its nemeses. Since the rise of Foucauldian psychoanalysis, the only image of a schizo represented
in pop-culture is the external image of madness, that of an inconceivable, semi-paralyzed madman lurching
in the manner of an intoxicated spider. The schizo can be found everywhere except in madness. (...) verything
excitingly schizoid, capable of attracting the merciless invasion of xeno-particles and igniting criminal
excitations, happens on the borders of identity and its regimes which balefully put up their resistance against any
malicious force. In order to draw schizo-lines of communication from the Outside, a rigorous course for dismantling identity is necessary, yet any serious attempt for total eradication of identity intrinsically excludes the space
of xeno-excitations and ends up in autistic nihilism. from: Reza Negarestani, Cyclonopedia, 2008
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VOGUE WITCH (Theory Fiction) digitally altered fashion photography, 2013
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