NEWS: REASONABLE AT PHOTOFESTIVAL LENZBURG (MAY 25 - JUNE 22 2024)
The Photographer’s Guide to Los Santos
May 25 - June 23 2024
Curated by Marco De Mutiis and Matteo Bittanti
address:
Dammweg 19
5600 Lenzburg
Switzerland
Opening hours:
Thu-Fri: 2-5 PM
Sat-Sun: 10 AM–5 PM
The Photographer’s Guide to Los Santos is an official exhibition of the Lenzburg Fotofestival in Lenzburg, Switzerland, and will be accessible from May 25 to June 23, 2024.
The Photographer’s Guide to Los Santos interrogates the ontological boundaries between physical and virtual spaces through an examination of photographic practices within the context of Rockstar North’s record-breaking 2013 video game Grand Theft Auto V. Situating Los Santos as a simulacrum of Los Angeles — the epicenter of global image production —, the exhibition explores the emergence of this fictional locale as a site of artistic experimentation and critical inquiry.
Curated by Marco De Mutiis, Digital Curator at the Fotomuseum Winterthur, and Matteo Bittanti, Associate Professor in Media Studies at IULM University in Milan, the exhibition explores the influence of video games — encompassing their aesthetics, logics, and tools — on photography, through the works by artists working at the intersection of post-photography, video games and art, including 2girls1comp, Raphael Brunk, Alan Butler, Mattia Dagani Rio, Elizabeth Desintaputri, Claire Hentschker, COLL.EO, and Georgie Roxby Smith.
Through meticulous in-game capture techniques and cunning manipulations of code, this cadre of international artists rupture the veneer of mimetic realism that shrouds Los Santos, opening fissures wherein the underlying algorithms and tacit ideological assumptions underpinning these contested spaces are hijacked. At once playful and critical, the featured projects — several of which have never been presented before — challenge the stability of categories such as the virtual, the real, and the hyperreal within an increasingly gamified culture.
The exhibition will be accompanied by an online resource and a database detailing significant post-photographic interventions within Grand Theft Auto V and, later on, a “how-to-photograph-the-virtual” critical guide.
read more
scheduled events
SATURDAY JUNE 22 2024
11:00 AM: It’s not a Game Over, it’s a Finissage
Saturday June 22 at 11.00 AM
Dammweg 19
4 & 5 Etage
5600 Lenzburg
Switzerland
Join Marco De Mutiis and Matteo Bittanti on Saturday, June 22 at 11 AM to celebrate the conclusion of The Photographer’s Guide to Los Santos exhibition at Photofestival Lenzburg. But don’t mistake this for another run-of-the-mill, self-congratulatory gathering fueled by endless prosecco. The curators will unveil a groundbreaking platform dedicated to in-game photography, ensuring the exhibition lives on indefinitely.
Like PFAs and other forever chemicals, we’re here to stay.
SUNDAY MAY 26 2024
10:00 AM – 5:00 PM: Guided tours with authors and curators,
you can find the complete list here
11:00 AM: Prosecco Conversation at Burghaldenhaus Lenzburg
Grand Theft Photo: Photography in Digital Spaces – a dialogue with Marco de Mutiis, Digital Curator for Photography at Fotomuseum Winterthur.
In cooperation with KulturKommission Lenzburg. Entrance fee required, free with festival pass, accompanied by sound metamorphoses with cello and electric guitar by Clara Dietzte and David Joffrey.
SATURDAY MAY 25 2024
From 10:00 AM: Opening of the exhibitions in Lenzburg and Aarau
10:00 AM – 5:00 PM: Guided tours with authors and curators,
you can find the complete list here.
6:00 PM - 9:00 PM: Vernissage of the Festival at Stapferhaus
Please register in advance.
7:30 PM: Tour through the exhibition “Microverses” with Kathrin Linkersdorff and Daniel Blochwitz
9:00 PM - 11:00 PM: Kraft-Party at Kraftreaktor, Lenzburg
DJ set with Pablo Color
Tickets on Eventfrog: 15 CHF; Free with Vernissage registration or Festival Pass.
SEE MORE: The Photographer’s Guide to Los Santos
PHOTOS: SIMULACRUM
We're happy to share some installation shots of Simulacrum, a group show currently on display at Noorderlicht Photogallery in Groningen, The Netherlands (it will run until June 25 2017). As you know, we are in great company: Mathieu Bernard-Reymond, Justin Berry, Eelco Brand, Roc Herms, Gerhard Mantz, Robert Overweg, Alan Warburton, and Rob Wetzer. We're showing The Fregoli Delusions, our 2015 machinima series. All photographs were taken by Marteen de Kok.
SHOW: SEEING WITH ANIMALS (MARCH 22-25 2017, EASTERN KENTUCKY UNIVERSITY)
We are delighted to announce that our 2014 series Menagerie will be exhibited in the context of the Living With Animals Conference 3: Co-Existence at Eastern Kentucky University in Richmond, Kentucky between March 22-25 2017.
Living With Animals 3 presents wide-ranging artistic, practical, and scholarly work. Julia Schlosser, Jessica Dallow, and Martha Robinson are co-organizing the exhibition “Seeing with Animals,” focusing on animal imagery and visual representation, beginning on Wednesday, 22 March. The conference also features the “Living with Horses” theme, with talks selected and chaired by Gala Argent and Angela Hofstetter, beginning on Thursday, 23 March. In addition, Living with Animals will be celebrating 25 years of the journal Society and Animals with a panel organized by Ken Shapiro and Margo DeMello, on Friday, 24 March. The organizers also plan to devote time on Saturday, 25 March, to issues surrounding teaching the animal.
Menagerie consists of layouts made of wood, glass, glue, paint, plexiglass, Schleich plastic animals and other materials. The layouts come in two configurations: 16 ½ x 12 ½ x 10 ½ inches (L x H x W) and 24 ½ x 12 ½ x 16 ¼ inches (L x H x W) and includes the following artworks: The Physical Impossibility of Death etc.; Art Farm etc.; Untitled etc.; I Like America etc.; Untitled etc.; Elephant in the Room etc.; Spring Training etc.; Hahn/Cock etc.; Würsa à 18000 Km etc. (March 31, 2014); Mother and Child etc.; Untitled (Twelve Live etc.); Best Before (April 3, 2014), and Elefant. It looks like this: