Architecture and objects
If disrupted, It becomes tangible
Sutrikus tai tampa apčiuopiama
Nacionalinė dailės galerija
Cybernetic ruins, fractured networks—where disruption reveals the politics of infrastructure.
The exhibition If Disrupted, It Becomes Tangible at the National Gallery of Art explores the political context of extractivist and logistical infrastructures, digital and information technologies (IT), affected by wars and political uprisings in the geography and temporality that goes beyond the post-Soviet condition.
Based on the ruins of the Soviet system of technical education, research and production—lately deregulated and mainly privatised — the development of IT introduced ex-Soviet countries to the global economic and labour market with its geographical unevenness. This process could be described as a specific form of IT colonialism that operates through the exploitation of a highly qualified and inexpensive labour force. However, the material base that we refer to as ‘cybernetic ruins’ was not neutral: historically, scientific knowledge and IT were developed as a part of the military-industrial complex, extractivist logistics and transportation, as well as the development of post-Soviet fossil capitalism with its neo-imperialist infrastructures.
The exhibition derives from the notion of infrastructure, which is understood as a way of distributing and organising power relations. Networks of infrastructure such as railways, gas pipelines, internet fibre optics, Telegram channels, video monitoring systems and so on remain intangible in everyday functioning. At the same time, their breakdown, disabling and interruption exposes the work of the whole infrastructure and their interconnectedness. In a literal sense, power and its materiality become visible, mundane and embodied through breakdown and interruption.
Based on the ruins of the Soviet system of technical education, research and production—lately deregulated and mainly privatised — the development of IT introduced ex-Soviet countries to the global economic and labour market with its geographical unevenness. This process could be described as a specific form of IT colonialism that operates through the exploitation of a highly qualified and inexpensive labour force. However, the material base that we refer to as ‘cybernetic ruins’ was not neutral: historically, scientific knowledge and IT were developed as a part of the military-industrial complex, extractivist logistics and transportation, as well as the development of post-Soviet fossil capitalism with its neo-imperialist infrastructures.
The exhibition derives from the notion of infrastructure, which is understood as a way of distributing and organising power relations. Networks of infrastructure such as railways, gas pipelines, internet fibre optics, Telegram channels, video monitoring systems and so on remain intangible in everyday functioning. At the same time, their breakdown, disabling and interruption exposes the work of the whole infrastructure and their interconnectedness. In a literal sense, power and its materiality become visible, mundane and embodied through breakdown and interruption.
Curators: Aleksei Borisionok, Antonina Stebur
Coordinators: Kotryna Markevičiūtė, Austėja Tavoraitė
Graphic designer - Valentin Duduk
Production architect - Mindaugas Reklaitis
Technical - Vytautas Narbutas
Photos by Gintarė Grigėnaitė, LNDM
Coordinators: Kotryna Markevičiūtė, Austėja Tavoraitė
Graphic designer - Valentin Duduk
Production architect - Mindaugas Reklaitis
Technical - Vytautas Narbutas
Photos by Gintarė Grigėnaitė, LNDM
Tekla Aslanishvili & Giorgi Gago Gagoshidze, Mariyam Medet, Yevgenia Belorusets, eeefff, Anna Engelhardt, fantastic little splash, Uladzimir Hramovich, The Museum of Stones editorial collective, Oleksiy Radynski, Alicja Rogalska, Sabīne Šnē, Nomeda & Gediminas Urbonas, XYANA