Founded in 2006 by Matteo Cremonesi, Filippo Cuttica, Davide Prati and Paolo Ruffino, the collective centres its work around the search for traces left in the present by the failure of narratives on the future of technology. Through a poetic and surreal reading of the myths of progress, IOCOSE produces new interpretations of the imaginaries, iconographies and rhetoric on technological innovation.
For the occasion, the group has collected a series of works made over the last decade which, as the curator explains,“are variously based on these two different types of movement: on one hand, the circularity of the loop, which can be interpreted in a variety of different ways, from repetition to an alternative vision of time; on the other, vectors, straight lines that indicate movement and direction, and which can also have multiple interpretations, from statistics to geometry”.
Right from the start, with its ironic and visionary attitude, the collective has used provocation, play and sci-fi as the central strategies in its practice “to critically explore the dominant narratives on technological progress and the future, and highlight glaring contradictions and failures.To describe their approach the four artists have coined the term ‘post-failure’, which they feel is the most suitable way of taking on a system – neoliberal, financialized capitalism – which is pushed forward thanks to reiterated visions of the future that are not only difficult to achieve but also have disastrous, unforeseen consequences for the vast majority of people and the planet.”
On occasion of the exhibition, Fondazione Modena Arti Visive will publish a catalogue that recounts the works on display through texts by IOCOSE, with a critical introduction by Francesca Lazzarini, and two short sci-fi stories written for the occasion by Simon O'Sullivan, professor of Art Theory and Practice in the Department of Visual Cultures at Goldsmiths College, University of London, and Anna M. Szaflarski, visual artist, performer and writer resident in Berlin. The exhibition is produced by FMAV in collaboration with MLZ Art Dep, Trieste, as part of the Level 0 prize promoted by ArtVerona, with the contribution of technical partners Tecnovision, Milan.
