Data shapes how we experience, understand and navigate the world. From government policies to the information we encounter every day, algorithms, artificial intelligence and data-driven systems increasingly influence our relationship with reality.
Data is often presented as objective and constant, as if it exists independently of human influence. Yet the systems built around it are shaped by human decisions, desires and power structures. What data is collected, how it is interpreted and what it is used for all reflect choices made by people. Even the seemingly neutral act of measuring or recording something begins with a decision to look, ask or act.
In a world increasingly organised around data, these systems influence how we understand consciousness, ethics, collective life and our ways of existing. But how much agency do we have over the data that shapes our reality?
The exhibition wraps up with an afterparty organised by STATE.DPT, titled State_of_<data>_afterparty. Make sure to stick around!
State_of_<data> brings together five artists whose practices engage with contemporary debates around data and its influence on society. Through different perspectives, they explore what it means to participate in, support, challenge or resist an increasingly data-driven world. The exhibition considers how we can reclaim agency within these systems and question the structures that shape our everyday lives.
As the first edition of the State_of_States series, the exhibition opens up a space to reflect on our relationship with data and the realities it constructs.
[María Pérez-Lozao Humanes] explores how technological systems shape consciousness and bodily experience. In A Prisoner’s Dream, she creates a gothic technological myth in which a computer harvests the dreams of three unconscious cyborg girls.
[Severi Aaltonen] works with archival footage, sound and outdated technology to investigate how power operates through digital infrastructures. In Interceptor, he manually reworks thousands of photographs to reclaim intimacy and empathy from the commercial logic of AI.
[Matthijs van den Berg] creates light installations and performances that bring attention back to physical, sensory experience. In APOPHENIA, refracted light and sound invite viewers to slow down and reconsider how they perceive and construct reality.
[Haeun Na] explores the ghosts of technological progress: those marginalised by the systems that promise greater connectivity. Through digital video, installations and humour, she questions the internet’s influence on our understanding of reality and the people rendered invisible by its infrastructure.
[Luca Oosterloo] explores the relationship between ecology, perception and digital memory. In IMG_0443.JPG, he examines how computational systems preserve information indefinitely, asking what happens to memory when forgetting becomes a failure and permanence a virtue.
This group exhibition is the result of a recent open call for emerging artists and makers who are not enrolled in an educational (art) programme. It is part of The Grey Space in the Middle’s programme supporting young artists and makers in developing their careers.
The project is supported by the Municipality of The Hague, Fonds 21, VSBfonds and the Creative Industries Fund NL (Stimuleringsfonds Creatieve Industrie).
