UMBRALES

12.11.2021 - 20.02.2022, Stuttgart

Collective exhibition at ifa Gallery Stuttgart (DE) in collaboration with BIENAL DE ARTES MEDIALES, Santiago de Chile (CHL).

Thresholds. How to tie time together?

What should a social order that seeks answers to the pressing issues facing society today look like? Which codes and focal points come together to form the social network of our time? How can art and culture contribute to a better understanding of the effects of human actions on the fragile ecosystem?

Within the scope of 15 bienal de artes mediales (media art biennale) in Santiago de Chile, the exhibition 'Umbrales – Thresholds' explores the transformation, insecurity and vulnerability of societies in times of multiple planetary crises. Being at the threshold means being in an intermediate state, in uncertainty, the unknown and unconscious, and also in a moment of change.

This joint project takes as its starting point the wave of protests against the government in Chile that began in October 2019. The country's deep and interlinked social and ecological crises are made evident. The protests resulted in the constitution of Chile, which still derived from the time of the Pinochet dictatorship, being rewritten – in a participative process that will be completed in 2023. Questions concerning ecological sensitivity, the recognition of a diversity of cultures and languages, gender equality, and the socio-technological nature of living environments are not only relevant in Chile. They all represent themes that require the reorganisation of different social orders around the world.

How to tie time together? – poses the question as to how entering into relationships with one another and finding orientation and contact in space and time. The exhibition sees itself as an invitation to sharpen the senses and sensitivity at a time of insecurity – to observe attentively, to listen and feel, and also to dream, imagine and remember, and to understand oneself as part of a complex constellation of interdependent relationships.

The exhibition is accompanied by an online publication that will accrue over the exhibition period, continuing the gathering of fragments, observations, thoughts, discussions, and shared exploration in a digital space.

The three new multimedia installations by the Chilean artists Elisa Balmaceda (born 1985) and Claudia González (born 1983) and the Brazilian artist Barbara Marcel (born 1985) look at various threshold moments: the protests on the streets in Chile, the landscapes and people exhausted by exploitation and industrialisation, the ruins and remnants of a modernised and accelerated world. A sense of interconnectedness is at the centre of these works, a feeling that makes the entanglements of life tangible. Beginning with these symbiotic nodes, these works explore a myriad of opportunities to create connections by means of and yet also in particular by going beyond human languages. In all of this, different forms of knowledge and old and new technologies intermingle and open up a new understanding of ourselves within the contexts of our lives.

Curators: Bettina Korintenberg, Enrique Rivera
Artists: Elisa Balmaceda with Rodrigo Ríos Zunino, Claudia González Godoy, Barbara Marcel, Elektra Wagenrad
Curator film programme: Florian Wüst
Project coordination and management: Constanza Güell

Exhibition website: https://www.ifa.de/en/exhibit/umbrales

The 15 bienal de artes mediales, Santiago de Chile takes place from 26.11.2021 – 31.03.2022.

Exhibition view “Umbrales”, ifa Gallery Stuttgart, 2021 / 2022 © ifa Gallery Stuttgart, photo: Andreas Körner

Exhibition view “Umbrales”, ifa Gallery Stuttgart, 2021 / 2022 © ifa Gallery Stuttgart, photo: Andreas Körner

Exhibition view “Umbrales”, ifa Gallery Stuttgart, 2021 / 2022 © ifa Gallery Stuttgart, photo: Andreas Körner

Exhibition view “Umbrales”, ifa Gallery Stuttgart, 2021 / 2022 © ifa Gallery Stuttgart, photo: Andreas Körner

Exhibition view “Umbrales”, ifa Gallery Stuttgart, 2021 / 2022 © ifa Gallery Stuttgart, photo: Andreas Körner

Exhibition view “Umbrales”, ifa Gallery Stuttgart, 2021 / 2022 © ifa Gallery Stuttgart, video: Barbara Marcel

Exhibition view “Umbrales”, ifa Gallery Stuttgart, 2021 / 2022 © ifa Gallery Stuttgart, video: Barbara Marcel

Exhibition view “Umbrales”, ifa Gallery Stuttgart, 2021 / 2022 © ifa Gallery Stuttgart, photo: Barbara Marcel

Exhibition view “Umbrales”, ifa Gallery Stuttgart, 2021 / 2022 © ifa Gallery Stuttgart, photo: Barbara Marcel

Exhibition view “Umbrales”, ifa Gallery Stuttgart, 2021 / 2022 © ifa Gallery Stuttgart, photo: Barbara Marcel

Poster of the exhibition “Umbrales”, ifa Gallery Stuttgart, 2021 / 2022 © ifa Gallery Stuttgart