MIRA 2018: THE SEARCH FOR (modern) PLEASURE

A project by MIRA Digital Arts Festival

On Thursday 8 November, coinciding with the first of the three days of the 8th edition, we will inaugurate the first exhibition project in the history of MIRA, “THE SEARCH FOR (modern) PLEASURE”, an exhibition that explores the theme of this edition: The notion of pleasure in the digital era and art as a catalyst of emotions and stimuli that evoke and promote a hedonistic vision of the human condition.

The exhibition, which will be held on the 1st floor at Fabra i Coats Centre d’Art Contemporani of Barcelonand will be open to the public until 16 December, will include works by Brooke Candy, Carlos Sáez, Claire Tolan, Esmay Wagemans, Faith Holland, Field, Filip Custic, Keiken + Nati Cerutti, Kirsten Lepore, Maria Roy, Marie Munk + Stine Deja i Virgen María.

Cyberculture, eroticism and the pursuit of universal values

Claire Tolan, US artist and programmer, and Kirsten Lepore, film and animation director, explore ASMR (Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response), a neologism that refers to the cyberculture phenomenon, and which is characterized by experiencing a pleasant bodily sensation that causes warmth and relaxation, in response to various visual and auditory stimuli.

US rapper and singer Brooke Candy will present her directorial debut and first film in collaboration with PornHub. “I Love You” is a porn film about empowerment, diversity and sexual liberation. The piece will be accompanied by a series of cuts from the production of the film, as well as out-takes shots.

Through the use of photography, digital editing and sculptural design, multidisciplinary artist Filip Custic develops a piece that looks to overcome banal pleasure to discover universal values.

Carlos Sáez presents an installation of sculptures and discarded machinery, creating objects related to the idea of relic or totem. The idea is based on preserving and admiring that which has fulfilled its function in history and transforming it into objects of desire.

Virgen María (aka María Forqué), multidisciplinary artist who will perform a series of performance appearances with live music during the three days of the festival, while New York-based new media artist Faith Holland and Barcelona-based artist and designer Maria Roy evoke sexual experience through eroticism or the critical positioning of sexuality as an experience exploited by digital and technological means.

The pieces by Marie Munk, Stine Deja and Esmay Wagemans explore the sculptural dimension as a stimulus of bodily sensations and manage to blur the line between the fiction represented by AI (Artificial Intelligence) technology and the authenticity of the human body.

Digital art studio FIELD present “Forays: Scan I-IV Collection”, courtesy of Sedition. Four computer-generated pieces that explore shape, materials, colours, mobility and how new technologies can fuse the abstract and the figurative form, sensual perception and synesthetic experiences.

Keiken featuring AGF HYDRA, George Jasper Stone and Suzannah Pettigrew in collaboration with sound artist Nati Cerutti present “Honey, I’m Data!”, an adaptation of their performative lecture, in which they navigate the realms of “Digital Pleasure”. Their video/sound installation unfolds the implications of artificial intelligence for the traditional human narratives of reality, fact, fiction and pleasure in a techno-capitalist society.

In collaboration with: