![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/metahaven_dread.jpg\" "\\"Untitled")
Untitled (for Dread) (2013) Wallpapers & T-Shirts by Metahaven<\/p>\n Untitled (for Dread) (2013) Wallpapers & T-Shirts by Metahaven<\/p>\n
An interview with Curator Juha van \u2018t Zelfde
By Sophia Satchell-Baeza
<\/b><\/p>\n
In the unclear boundaries of the internet and the facelessness of surveillance technology, it often feels like daily life offers solid ground for paranoia. \u201cDread: Fear in the Age of Technological Acceleration\u201d is an exhibition at the De Hallen Museum in the small town of Haarlem in the Netherlands, that looks at the work of various contemporary artists and how they interpret and react to the dizzying possibility of modern technology. Spanning various media \u00ad\u2013 including a program of music in Amsterdam\u2019s Musiekgebouw, \u201cDread\u201d traces these varying responses to modern technology, often with a mixture of fear, resentment, or confusion. This specific notion of dread is closely linked to the Danish philosopher S\u00f8ren Kierkegaard\u2019s concept of the \u201cdizziness of freedom\u201d, posited in \u201cThe Concept of Dread\u201d (1844). For anyone who\u2019s surfed the net and found themselves three hours later miles off from where they\u2019d started, this is probably familiar.<\/p>\n
At the helm of Dread is the DJ, journalist and award-winning curator Juha van \u2018t Zelfde. His exhibition in De Hallen was realised with the help of a curatorial grant by the Van Toorn Scholten Foundation. His starting point for putting together the show? The utopian anti-capitalist city of \u201cNew Babylon,\u201d imagined by Dutch artist Constant between 1956-1974.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen researching the collection of De Hallen for my proposal, I found the \u2018Labyrismen of Constant\u2019,\u201d van \u2018t Zelfde explains. The Labyrismen\u00a0\u201care almost like a summary of Constant\u2019s entire project.<\/b> When revisiting some of the things I had read about New Babylon, I remembered architect Mark Wigley talking to Geoff Manaugh of BLDGBLOG about the horror of New Babylon, and of Constant’s loss of hope in people. In 1968, around the time of the Vietnam War and the student protests in Europe, he became disheartened about the prospect of the freedoms of New Babylon. You see this in the lithographs, with turmoil, blood and, in the end, a burning city.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/constant_labyrismen_1.jpg\" "\\"Constant")
Constant Labyrismen, 1968 Series of lithographs 38 x 47,5 cm Collection Frans Hals Museum | De Hallen Haarlem. Photo Arend Velsink<\/p>\n
\u00a0These lithographs are on view in the final room of the exhibition, where they are displayed alongside Mark Wigley\u2019s dread-laced comment on Constant\u2019s final realisation of utopia as a place where \u201cpeople will actually kill each other because we\u2019re dark, miserable creatures.\u201d<\/p>\n
The exhibition offers mixed interpretations of dread across several genres and media. Whether in the investigation of drone surveillance in Laurent Grasso\u2019s\u00a0\u201cOn Air\u201d, Jonas Lund\u2019s hacker-inspired \u201cPublic Access Me\u201d or the informational overload of Thomas Hirschhorn and Marcus Steinweg\u2019s \u201cThe Map of Headlessness\u201d \u2013 technological advancement is depicted in a strange limbo between entrapment and possibility, a freedom sullied by fear. In Alicia Framis\u2019 \u201cRoom To Forget\u201d (2012-2013), a construction of a room is filled with Metyrapone, a medicine used in the army to remove bad memories.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor me dread is a readiness for danger, an understanding that something harmful may happen\u201d van \u2018t Zelfde says. \u201cDread is\u00a0a bad memory of the future. <\/b>It is evolutionarily hardwired in all of us to recognise risks and to anticipate threats. Dread is of relevance in the post-9\/11, post-PRISM world of technological acceleration and digital accumulation.\u201d<\/p>\n
But isn\u2019t there danger in piling on the fear without offering some sort of constructive solution, too? \u201cI like to believe dread can be a constructive emotion. At the very least, it is one that gives us the option to act.\u00a0Since dread indicates a future threat, it means there is time to respond to it. There might not always be a solution or salvation, but becoming aware of the shadow of the future is the first step to confront our fears and overcome catastrophe.\u201d<\/p>\n