Agency of Living Organisms

Agency of Living Organisms is an exhibition that observes the interaction and communication between phenomena within different ecosystems throughout the lithosphere, atmosphere, biosphere, and hydrosphere.

The impetus comes from a micro-scale observation: compared to humans, plants and other living organisms have a different, sometimes surprisingly sophisticated sensorium with which they interact and exist within their surroundings. Similarly this sensibility towards its immediate environment is a characteristic of the artists among us. In such, this project offers a research into the interaction between both of those protagonists.

In response to the theme in question, the project proposes an exhibition with interconnected commissioned and existing works as a social living sculpture, an expanding format that opens the walls of the Tabakalera’s exhibition halls into the urban, natural and "online" environment. The use of the word “sculpture” harks back to Joseph Beuys’s notion of “social sculpture” as “how we shape our thoughts into words [and] how we mold and shape the world we live in." The fascination around the medium of sculpture derives from its notion as a work that exists in relation to its surroundings. “Humans are not an outside force perturbing an otherwise natural system but rather an integral and interacting part of the Earth System itself.”

A new kind of nature is being created, one that is shaped by humanity. It consists of the sum of all the changes caused by humans on earth. Today the technosphere and the biosphere interact to form neo-natural phenomena.

Experimental guided walks by artists and scientists will expand on the exhibited works and moreover performances and lectures, as well as an online expanding life version will further deepen the content and research undertaken for this project.

Agency of Living Organisms exhibition is devoted to the project developed by Pauline Doutreluingne during her residency in Tabakalera in autumn 2015 as a result of the first open call for curators.

Curator: Pauline Doutreluingne

Artists: Anne Duk Hee Jordan, Esther Kokmeijer, Gerard Ortín, Iain Ball, Iratxe Jaio and Klaas van Gorkum, Lara Almarcegui, Maider López, New Mineral Collective, Tere Recarens, Tue Greenfort, El Conde de Torrefiel, Koenraad Van den Driessche and Nader Koochaki