Wednesday 25 March 2009

Embedded Art (Above Ground)







The above images taken on the ground floor of the Akademie der Künste should give you some impression of how the Embedded Art show structured the experience of art and security to the casual visitor.

The first picture shows the front of the Akademie during daylight hours – inside the main entrance was a sign instructing members of the public to ‘proceed in an orderly manner to check-in counter for more information’. Long lengths of incident tape, similar to the fragment captured in the second picture, marked out a clear path to ‘check in’, severely restricting access to the Akademie reception area, while long lines of tourist attempt to negotiate what appears to be an open space.

Pictures three and four are of actual exhibits accessible above ground. One shows a detail of the extraordinary operations table in the ‘War Room’ created by Lillevan and Zaji Chalem. The other shows ‘Security Song: A Complete Analysis’ by Paul B Davis – the unattended item of luggage, left inside the main elevator, plays back a reassuringly jolly remix of Gershon Kingsley’s ‘Security Song’ over and over again, rendering any casual visitor to the Akademie considerably less casual than they were before.

The next post will document some of things that were happening at the Embedded Art below ground.

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