This solo show from multi-media artist Renee Rilexie “Hive Mind” addresses questions, asking what means to be human in the digital era. Posing a number of questions about identity, technology and isolation/connection stemming from our hyper connected lives.
A series of mannequin heads is transformed by the insertion of thousands of metal pins and the application of mobile SIM cards, inviting us to question where humanity begins and technology ends. Are we now defined by the Subscriber Identity Modules of our phones and tablets? Or are we still in control?
Apart of the heads, the artist also uses the accessories of such technological materials in a playful way: for instance, she takes the discarded SIM cards, languishing beyond their use in what she has called a “simentery”, and she also pokes fun to the “slogans” of companies and providers when promoting their particular brands. This playful approach has also a disturbing side: it seems that we are losing our capacity to decide and to interact in the world without technology. Indeed, the craftsmanship of the whole exhibition, the dedication of the artist to weave and use more than 5000 SIM cards and around 100000 pins, make this show very tactile and sensorial, which relates to her previous exhibitions.
In this show, the artist pushes us to reconnect to the flesh, to the sensual, to the arcane, and she invites us to “switch off our devices and join her to discover whether the hive mind we’ve created is a dream come true or a nightmare in progress.”