16 AUGUST - 9 SEPTEMBER
FRONT GALLERY
FELTGRADUATE AWARD

MARIAN SANDBERG
THE PRESENCE

Works shown

The Presence, 2023, found loom, 3d printed plastic, cotton, ink, compressed air and artificial intelligence, 100 x 150 x 200cm

Statement

“Wherever you are, be there totally” - Ekhart Tolle

Where am I? Physically, I’m here. Mentally, I’m somewhere else. Digitally, I’m everywhere. The Presence is an interactive kinetic sculpture that explores the relationship between our physical and digital selves.

There’s just one me and one you, but online our presence becomes complex. Social platforms attempt to replicate facets of presence in different ways - bodily movement becomes a pin on a map, action becomes a status update, emotional response becomes a “like” or “share” while snapshots of the self fit in a neat little square.

The digital realm holds many fragments of “self”, geographically distributed, wildly accessible, searchable and always on. These fragments are a version of the past self, existing in perpetuity, ready to be re-activated as others scroll past.

On approach, The Presence senses you are here, and responds. Physical and digital presence are united on an endless feed of canvas, scrolled in perpetuity, accruing marks in response to bodily movement. We are left with a physical artefact of those who have scrolled before us, and those who will scroll past us.

As viewers move through the space The Presence invites them to reflect on their own relationship with technology and consider the interwoven nature of our physical and digital selves.

The artist would like to acknowledge Stelarc (artistic mentor) and Adam Jenkins (robotics mentor) for their contributions to this project. The Presence is made possible through the support of Arts SA and FELTspace, developed during sponsored residency at Praxis Artspace.

Bio

Marian Sandberg is an emerging artist living and working on Kaurna land.

She seeks to understand what it means to be human in this age of technology. In order to do so, her practice questions what humans gain and lose through interfacing with machines. Through installation, sculpture and textiles, she assembles data structures, algorithms and machines that perform considered shifts to entrenched distributions of agency.

She calls on a wide array of technologies, from needle and thread to electronics, breaking apart and inserting herself in to technical systems in order to locate and define her own humanity. A diverse collection of old and new technologies are brought together and programmed in the expanded field, offering alternative systems to inhabit and grounds for re-thinking inherited technological norms.

Marian holds a Bachelor of Visual Art from the Adelaide Central School of Art and a Master of Information Systems from the University of South Australia. She is a Hatched alumni, recipient of the Praxis ARTSPACE Studio Residency, FELTspace Graduate Award, and the James Martin Award. She is never quite sure where her keys are, and wonders if Siri gets tired of finding them.

Photography: Brianna Speight