“Insatiable Machines” is a solo show of artist Saint Machine curated by Carmen Casiuc which showcases an artistic investigation into how humans, living organisms and machines control and communicate with each other through a complex dynamics of grace and greed. Working with programmers, physicists, engineers, 3d animators and sound artists, Saint Machine develops sophisticated systems to realize ambitious productions in which the experience of the public becomes an integral part of the artwork. Turning to design, cyberculture and speculative fiction as aesthetic templates, she creates high-tech phygital environments that refer to Christian thought and ritualistic behavior while presenting an animist vision of a technological future. Melding Eastern and Western forms and mixing transcendental themes with open appeal to embodied experiences, the artist proposes a cultural condition in which aesthetics, spirituality and technology intermingle. Insatiable Machines is part of Halucinarium’s Redeeming the time program.

“Insatiable Machines” reunites three large-scale body installations created between 2014-2019 and having received international attention. “Sacred Egg”, “Hybrid Sensorium” and “I, Human” are organisms with a virtual core assimilating the public into their system through a carefully designed communication network of diverse media such as 3D imaging, resin and fibreglass sculptures, sound and bioart that is dependent of each user’s sensorial and psychological data. As in a religious experience, the phygital works demand belief and unconditional love in exchange of access into a sacred cyberspace in which both human and non-human life is improved and protected. The synergetic relationship developed in this fashion alters the conscious state of the public, invoking transcendental experiences which question the boundaries of personhood and the individuality of expression.

Revealing a renewed sensibility towards new technologies and a critical view of their ubiquitous adoption in today’s society, “Insatiable machines” by Saint Machine generates an all-encompassing sensing environment of mutually programming harmony that reflects upon the modeling of collective affects produced within the holy tension of love and power between human, machines and nature.

foto: Roald Aron

Event partner: Unilever