#SMARTMOBILITY, #SOFTBRANDABSTRACTS, #HANDHELD, #DARKWALLET, #SLABWORKS, #VITALCONTENT, #JAILBREAKGESTURE
Kari Altmann, “Soft Mobility Abstracts,” 2014. Courtesy the artist
Works by the artist Kari Altmann take the shape of expansive and evolving teams of media. Bound by sets of tags, images and videos unfold across interrelated social media, as well as leak into physical installations, whose documentation is often recycled back into new online projects. Aiming to operate more like open fields of visual culture than discreet art objects, her works eschew formal limits and, instead, dilate around themes including biopolitics, feminism, and posthumanism.
For “Soft Mobility Abstracts,” her new project commissioned by First Look, the associated tags include #jailbreakgesture, #softmobility, #vitalcontent, and #credit—a list that describes an interest in networked survivalism, which Altmann has explored through previous projects including “R U In?S” (2009–ongoing). Here, a preoccupation with alternative currency mashes with open-sourced weapons and found foods to explore how a current survivalist fantasy can be fetishized into a visual brand. Throughout the month, and after, “Soft Mobility Abstracts” will develop through a stream of media that begins with the launch of the project, and will include handheld “phonecam” videos capturing performances, as well as found or sourced material.
Instagram: @softmobility
Vine: @softmobility
Tumblr: softmobility.tumblr.com
