Artefacts

Parsons Thesis Show Script

We represent the High Focus Institute. The High Focus Institute is dedicated to the pursuit of technotranscendence.

Technotranscendence is the state of technologically mediated self knowledge which empowers the individual experiencing it to transcend the limitation of the technosphere that they inhabit.

The technosphere denotes all human creation.

Have you previously experienced this state?

Place your hand upon this object and consider this statement carefully -

The horror of nature is indifference towards us, we must remake it such that it should care for us.

We have remade nature without understanding how it will remake us

We cannot give ourselves what we need until we understand what our needs are

Have you considered your future

We have considered your future

Testing indicates you are a prime candidate.

Your inter view will be conducted at the HFI central offices. During conference hours at our global SUMMIT May 27 - 29

SUMMIT Lineup

Welcome to SUMMIT:

The HIGH FOCUS INSTITUTE’s conference on Nature, Technology & Self.

Installation & performing artists will present current and new work at the edge of their fields connecting identity, human ingenuity and the cosmos. And discuss. And dance. 

FRIDAY: 6-10pm *Opening Program
SATURDAY: 12-8pm *Installations Open
.................................. 8pm-1am *GODDESS PARTY VII, SUMMIT EDITION*
SUNDAY: 2-10pm *Closing Program

--FEATURING--

SUNNY QUETZALCOATL

JEN PLASKOWITZ

THOM ULMER

DANIEL KLAG

ERICA SCHREINER

OCULUS COLLECTIVE

CHRISTINA LAFONTAINE

STEWART LOSEE

ALEX BASCO KOCH

DEAN ANTHONY CERCONE

WILDER DUNCAN

SAINTS OF AN UNNAMED COUNTRY

NYSSA FRANK & MIKE GARCIA

AYODAMOLA OKUNSEINDE

BIRCE ÖZKAN

ALANA AVIEL

&

A NEW ENVIRONMENTAL INTERVENTION BY THE HIGH FOCUS INSTITUTE: NOW HIRING

We represent the HIGH FOCUS INSTITUTE. 

THE HIGH FOCUS INSTITUTE is dedicated to bringing technotranscendence into the reach of every person.

The horror of nature is its indifference towards us.

The wind blows: a sweet breeze or a storm, the wind does not understand our needs or our bodies.

We ARE fragile, though sometimes we forget it.

The purpose of technology is to change nature into something that responds to OUR needs.

Something that understands us.

Not NATURE, but NURTURE.

How do we do this? How do we remake nature such that it cares for us?

The human genius is that of INVENTION. every thing we make to shield us from the storm, to predict & redirect it to serve our needs, that is TECHNOLOGY.

NATURE.

TECHNOLOGY.

THE WAY THINGS ARE.

THE WAY WE MAKE THEM TO BE.

NOW Mother Earth ...

... is Spaceship Earth, TECHNOLOGY is the condition. Nothing has not been touched by the efforts of humankind, not even the weather.

But what did we do? How did we get here? We have remade nature, without understanding how it will remake us.

We were blind to the consequences, but TECHNOLOGY itself has allowed us to see them, and to see that The World is now of our own making.

We laid this trap for ourselves, & we must escape from it as well.

TECHNOLOGY not only keeps our bodies safe from the elements, it also extends our understanding of the world around us so that we can effectively intervene in response to our needs.

WHAT do we really need?

How can we answer that question without knowing WHO we are?

Here at HFI we believe that not only can we use TECHNOLOGY to shape the world around us, we can use it to understand the world INSIDE us.

We cannot give ourselves what we need until we understand what our needs are.

Thus, we strive to use TECHNOLOGY to better know ourselves.

The High Focus Institute is here to help.

Our interventions are technological environments specifically designed to promote reflection & contemplation, to provide our participants with the tools to achieve TECHNOTRANSCENDENCE, a state of self knowing amplified by techno-spiritual engagement.

The success of our intervention this fall inspired us here at the HIGH FOCUS INSTITUTE to further our outreach activities with a NEW intervention: NOW HIRING.

And indeed, the HIGH FOCUS INSTITUTE is NOW HIRING. The weekend of Memorial Day we want YOU to be part of an exhibition addressing the issues the HIGH FOCUS INSTITUTE... Focuses on. Use this card to contact us and find out more.

We hope that you will join us, contribute to the conversation, & discover within yourself the potentiality for TECHNOTRANSCENDENCE, for the sake of us all.

(cue fog machine)

Website design layout in progress ---

High Focus Institute at the Immersive Lab in Zurich

The High Focus Institute has been selected for a residency in Switzerland at the immersive Lab at the Zurich University for the Arts.

http://immersivelab.zhdk.ch/

"The ‘Immersive Lab’ is an artistic and technological research project of the Institute of Computer Music and Sound Technology at the Zurich University of the Arts. It is a media space that integrates panoramic video, surround audio with full touch interaction on the entire screen surface. The ‘Immersive Lab’ provides a platform for a catalogue of artistic works that are specifically tailored to the unique situation that this configuration offers. These works articulate the relationship between immersive media and direct interaction. It functions both as a space for experimental learning and creation and as a permanent audiovisual installation for the general public, showing finished pieces in a self-explanatory way."

SUMMIT

In order to demonstrate the ritual to an audience within a social context, but also more broadly perform the philosophy of the movement as a social sculpture. To borrow the term from Josef Beuys, incorporating art on a societal level with the intention of transformational impact (at least on the microcultural scale). In this way, The High Focus Institute seeks to structure a small scale social environment as a means of disseminating its philosophy, both via social experience of the immersive rituals but also via collaboration with surrounding artists.

The choice of the title “SUMMIT” deliberately evokes the ideas coming together for the purposes of sharing ideas, as well as a metaphorical high point of experience while also paying attention to the absurdity of the term used within corporate language as business and economic summits. Relating particularly to the NOW HIRING ritual and its re-imagining of economic labor towards a shared emotional sensory “doing”.

THE HIGH FOCUS INSTITUTE presents:SUMMIT. A three-day exhibition of performance and installation On the relationship between SELF NATURE & TECHNOLOGY. A large open former industrial warehouse was chosen in keeping with the ethos of operating outside the commercial gallery context, using artist run spaces. Similarly a compressed timeline of 3 days was chosen to focus attendance towards a social happening rather than a succession of individual experiences. This shortened time frame also allows for an integration between performers and constructed environments. Each artist is selected based upon prior work and provided the curatorial statement, as well as an allotment of space.

Curatorial Statement

NATURE: THE WAY THINGS ARE.

TECHNOLOGY: THE THINGS WE MAKE.

The term “technology” includes every product of human invention, from a sharpened stick to virtual networks. The things we make in turn remake us & shift our understanding of what is possible

NOW Mother Earth is Spaceship Earth. TECHNOLOGY is the condition. Nothing has not been touched by the efforts of humankind, not even the weather. Here at THE HIGH FOCUS INSTITUTE we believe that not only can we use TECHNOLOGY to shape the world around us, we can use it as a tool to reconcile ourselves to the realities of NATURE.

We strive to use TECHNOLOGY to gain control over our surroundings, and the act of engaging with those surroundings IS the story of our SELF. The process of creating things is the process of creating identity.

How do we make meaning out of the modern world, which is constructed primarily of human artifacts?

How do we use that meaning to help us understand our place in the cosmos?