The radical changes that have taken place in our daily life over the past year are now being transformed into a planetary feeling of fatigue and anxiety. To avoid confronting the ubiquitous presence of virulent matter, we try to subtract any mention of it from our discourse. The exhibition aims to introduce an opposite movement that leads to a multistoried comprehension of the biological and social concepts of virality.
The contemporary understanding of the virus has evolved through centuries of medical and cultural development, from the miasma theory of the Middle Ages to the germ theory of the 19th century that identified microscopic pathogens as culprits. By the 20th century, advances in virology transformed the virus into a symbol of an invisible, alien enemy, intensifying societal anxieties about its omnipresence and potential to destabilize our world. However, the idea of viral matter is much broader than the framework formed by the destabilizing logic of the pandemic.
A virus is not just an isolated biological entity. Our bodies and daily lives are closely linked to viruses. Viral agents interact with humans and other non-human animals on a daily basis. They alter flower patterns, incorporate their DNA into our cells, and influence evolutionary strategies. Not only is the nature of viruses hostile to humans, but their usefulness is still unknown. Discussions about their importance, function in the beginning of life, and development of the human body are still going strong today.
Virological research of the past decades has radically changed our understanding of the meaning of viruses, calling for a rethinking of persistent categories of hostility. By rejecting assertions, the exhibition project stems from the logic of questioning and the need to redefine the role of the virus agent. In an effort to map our neighborhood with viruses, the project calls for the search for alternative models of interaction based on becoming-with-the-virus.
The name “Staying with the Trouble” refers to the book of the same name by Donna Haraway and suggests experiencing the extraordinary times in the "thick present", becoming-with, rebuilding the networks of relationships with the Earth and its inhabitants, including the minimal viral entities.
Haraway describes our time as one in which the human and nonhuman are inextricably linked by a tight web of processes. In order to make sense of the present and learn to stay with the trouble of living together, we must opt for sympoiesis, or making-with, rather than auto-poiesis, or self-making, emphasizing on the recognition of the connection between all occupants of Earth, thus leading to the creation of a more livable future.
Using the optics of Art & Science, the exhibition attempts to delineate an elusive virulent reality. The artworks on display as a part of the Staying with the Trouble project takes an anthropological, technological, scientific, and poetic approach to the study of the virus. By offering to befriend a virus, exploring the logic of viral time, and seeing a performer as a virus, the artists seek to redefine our position in the world of viruses and try to represent interaction with the virus in the logic of conscious mutation and sympoiesis. To stop being afraid of something, we suggest looking at it from multiple perspectives.
Curators of the educational program:
Khristina Ots, Laura Elidedt Rodriguez, Asya Kaplan
Coordination:
Asya Kaplan
Technical direction:
Alexey Feskov
Head of Art & Science Center:
Aliya Sakhariyeva
Artists:
Anna Ridler, Heather Dewey-Hagborg, Harm van den Dorpel, Neïl Beloufa, Pei-Ying Lin, Tuomas A. Laitinen, iBiom, Natalia Balabanova, Yulia Vergazova, Nikolay Ulyanov, Lera Lerner, Natalia Tikhonova, Nadezhda Bey
