Import Projects invites you to join the CHECK OUT event series. On four evenings, the happenings will reflect on contemporary authorship and authority. Installations, performances, discussions and a workshop will explore themes and puns such as Platform Capitalism vs. Sharing Economy, Mediation vs. Meditation, Self-Checkout vs. Obsession, Terror vs. Revolution.

For his ongoing installation project Aram Bartholl collects different objects and materials of the contemporary commerce and public space to rearrange them at the exhibition space. The elements refer to radical shifts in markets, rising control and a life under the influence of constantly improved algorithms, startup pressure and 'bullshit jobs'. Over the period of the exhibition the installation is rearranged and changes in dialogue with the audience. Dani Ploeger will present work that emerged from a journey across Europe to examine the recent (re-)militarization of civilian spaces as part of digital culture. A collection of three pieces engages with ways in which firearms and other means of ‘low-tech’ violence persist amidst contemporary obsessions with data surveillance, cybercrime, and high-tech warfare. This winter, Alanna Lawley explores the notion of winter depression through her artist in residency in Iceland. ‚Saunatorium’ is an experimental beginning to her research – a group of sauna steam tents installed inside the gallery invite visitors to physical and emotional detoxification. With an increasing awareness of the necessity to address the lack of psychological security within our culture, and the impact of our environment on our well being, Lawley will investigate the potential of an architecture as an alternative healing modality.The audio/visual art project ‚French Kiss With Enya pt. 1’ by Curver Thoroddsen examines the effect and aura of 90’s ethereal pop icon Enya in popular culture. Led by Icelandic multidisciplinary artist Curver Thoroddsen and curator Nadim Samman the project mixes music, visuals and sensory inputs from a selection of Icelandic artists and scholars including members of Sigur Rós.

Program Overview:
Lecture performance ‘Schreckschusswaffe’ (blank gun) by Dani Ploeger 

In his lecture performance ‘Schreckschusswaffe’ (blank gun), Dani will present video documentation and artwork that emerged from several journeys he made across Europe over the past year to examine the recent (re-)militarization of civilian spaces in the context of omnipresent digital culture. 

Since 2015, heavily armed police officers and soldiers have been conspicuously deployed on the streets of Western European metropoles, while a news media have increasingly featured volunteer militias equipped with Soviet-era weapons who are training for – and participating in – conventional war scenarios in Central Europe. Meanwhile, experiences of the public spaces in which these developments take place are highly determined by advanced (mobile) consumer technologies. Starting from his own ambiguous relationship to firearms, which is driven by a paradoxical combination of childhood fascinations and critical theory, ‘Schreckschusswaffe’ connects cultural criticism with subversive technologies and gunfire.