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Metamorphoses of Control

Place: Künstlerverein Malkasten, Düsseldorf

Date: -

Artists: Isabella Fürnkäs

Works: Metamorphoses of Control

With the interdisciplinary exhibition and performance project “Metamorphoses of Control” by Isabella Fürnkäs, the Osthaus Museum presented a reflection on existential conditions in the digital age with references spanning different eras. Isabella Fürnkäs (born in Tokyo in 1988) has created a special room installation with videos, drawings, and, as a central element, a performance based on Théodore Géricault's painting “The Raft of the Medusa” (1818/1819), which enters into dialogue with the Osthaus Museum's collection and the rooms, some of which were designed by Henry van de Velde. Compared to Géricault's visually stunning and emotionally charged drama, the scene depicted here seems like a vision of a transhuman reality. The image of a technoid raft full of isolated and unrecognizable individuals is created, whose struggle for survival takes place in the immateriality of the mind. The boundaries between performers, island landscape, and viewers become blurred. Like voyeurs, viewers become witnesses to the individuals on display. The question of pain and suffering in a technologized vision of the future also arises in comparison to Géricault's painting. The staging resembles a tableau vivant and negotiates questions of transcendence, role-playing, and immateriality. Isabella Fürnkäs' performative video installation was presented at the Osthaus Museum in July 2018 and the documentation was shown at Mouches Volantes in July 2022.

- Text by Ihsan Alisan


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