S(t)imulation.Zone (2020-2022)
22-OCT–2021 - 06-FEB-2022
SWIPE RIGHT! Data, Dating, Desire
Group Show
iMAL,Art Center for Digital Cultures & Technology, Brussels
Curator: Valentina Peri
with:
!Mediengruppe Bitnik, Adam Basanta, CROSSLUCID, Dries Depoorter, Elisa Giardina Papa, Tom Galle, John Yuyi & Moises Sanabria, Noemi Iglesias, Lancel/Maat, Joana Moll, Ingo Niermann & The Army Of Love, Eva Ostrowska, Dani Ploeger, Addie Wagenknecht & Pablo Garcia
Original commission by K41, Kiev, Ukraine
S(t)imulation.Zone is an edition originally ideated and curated for Kyiv’s new safer space and a club ∄ deriving from our extensive research on the topic of digital intimacy.
It involves an interactive website with an array of hyperlinked connections, becoming a fine-lined visual compass in a sensual quest for blended orgasms, submerged in the landscapes of physically collaged bodies, digital assets sculpted in VR and tactile textures, an online collection of critical and informative resources and simultaneously an entry point for further inspiration and playful explorations IRL.
More than 50 information nodes feature a variety of artists, collectives, scholars, platforms and queer initiatives eg. Paul B. Preciado, McKenzie Wark, Dennis Cooper, Sophie Lewis, Zheng Bo, Institute of Queer Ecology, Queering the Map, Future of Sex, Feminist Internet and Queer AI amongst others, allowing users to bleed into the modes of unbounded exploratory play, where ‘winning or losing’ or an ultimate climax reward per se, become secondary.
S(t)imulation.Zone wants to create an open sphere to deconstruct the assimilated social structures on sexuality and gender, to transmit a positive message on sex and the erotic, to defy body politics and to transverse the idea of intimacy, questioning erroneous stereotypes and presenting different gender expressions.
For the concise publication, accompanying S(t)imulation.Zone we invited three writers and thinkers: Bini Adamczak, with her groundbreaking text ’On circlusion,' Elvia Wilk with her insightful ‘Erotics of Rot’ and @aevtarperform with their poetic Intimate Nodes of Thought. It also features resident DJs and musicians presenting their bespoke sonic landscapes for sensual derive. The booklet is encapsulated in a cover incorporating a selection of stickers with QR codes, creating a potent interfaces bridging the boundless explorations and information-exchange of the website and the public sphere of contemporary Ukraine.
Website implementation: Bureau Cool