2018 might be remembered as the year of graphic cards shortage. The price for the cards soared since the beginning of that year, parallel to the price of Bitcoin and other crypto-currencies. Their strong processing capabilities made graphic cards an ideal tool for amateur crypto-mining. Interestingly enough, the graphic card is usually used for rendering visual plans and programs (from architectural plans to videogames), but here it was used for something that has no visual presence as far as human vision is considered. This is a telling example of where power is today – unattainable by the human eye. Therefore, we who are working in the field of the visual, are compelled to renegotiate our understanding of vision and power. In this talk, we will look at the exhibition as a model which assess relations. Working towards a book titled Metastability, Simon’s talk will explore the knowledge produced by contemporary art curatorial practices, asking what kind of relations and connections are available in contemporary art curating and how those operate in relation to the world.
Joshua Simon, curator and author. Former director and chief curator at MoBY-Museums of Bat Yam (2012- 2017), now based in Philadelphia, PA. Co-founding editor of the Tel Aviv-Jaffa based Maayan publishing. Author of Neomaterialism (Sternberg Press, 2013), and editor of United States of Palestine-Israel (Sternberg Press, 2011), Ruti Sela: For The Record (Archive Books, 2015), Communists Anonymous (with Ingo Niermann, Sternberg Press, 2017), and Being Together Precedes Being: A Textbook for The Kids Want Communism (Archive Books, forthcoming 2018). Recent curatorial projects include: The Kids Want Communism (MoBY-Museums of Bat Yam and Kunstraum Kreuzberg Bethanien, Berlin, 2016-2017), Second Nature (International Photography Festival, Tel Aviv 2017), and In The Liquid (PrintScreen Media Art Festival, Holon 2018). Simon holds a PhD from the Visual Cultures department, Goldsmiths College, University of London, UK.