YOU_SER: THE CENTURY OF THE CONSUMER EXHIBTION
On the occasion of its anniversary celebration “10 Years of ZKM in Hallenbau A,” ZKM | Center for Art and Media turns its attention to the effects of net-based, global creation on art and society with the exhibition “You_ser: The Consumer Century”. Instructions for use and changeable objects activate beholders. In this way the visitor takes part in the construction of the artwork. On the Internet, portals such as www.flickr.com, www.youtube.com, www.myspace.com; and virtual worlds, such as www.secondlife.com or blogs now offer a newly structured space for the creative statements of millions of people. The artist no longer has a monopoly on creativity. Users deliver or generate the content or put it together. They become producers and program designers and thereby, competitors to television, radio and newspapers, the historical media monopoly. Audience participation reshapes itself as consumers’ emancipation. These transformations concern not only the global expanses of the Internet, but also the museum. It reacts to the changed cultural and social behaviour and supports those tendencies, which, in an Enlightenment spirit, are applied for democracy and the idea of access to education for all. The new installations presented in the exhibition transfer the potential for co-designing by the user that has been developed on the Internet into the context of art and allow the visitors to emancipate themselves.
The exhibition is on at ZKM museum, Karlsruhe, Germany from 21 October – 31 December.