Crash Test Dummy

Location: Gödör Klub

Processes of social transformation, surveillance and control scenarios, the disappearance of the social welfare safety net, the challenge of global migration: occidental society is turning into a crash test scenario with an unpredictable outcome. And within this scenario the social individual is becoming the dummy and its body the site of the impact. A bio-utopian agora, staged in public space, is to generate an experience of the current desperate social situation, making it tangible both intellectually as well as emotionally.

A number of factors are triggering an aggravation of these circumstances that is imprinting itself on the body: the shifts occurring in the geo-political power structures, altered visions of society, the new demands of mobility and flexibility being made on the individual while social safeguards are increasingly cutback, problems in dealing with immigration and integration, the recurrent flare-ups of racism, and last but not least the general sense of uncertainty generated by terrorism. On the one hand, citizens are being led to believe that more stringent security measures are needed, and that this should be tackled by introducing video surveillance, biometric documents, etc. The citizen is potentially a biometrically documented cyberbody and “transparent individual.” At the same time, we are exposed to more and more real threats, such as those stemming from the dismantling of the social welfare system.

Another observable trend is the decomposition of national and other ties to our origins, which demands social and political reorientation if the European individual is to survive in an individualized future. Individualization is the magic word and the vision for configuring the future. At the same time though, this vision suppresses an important aspect: for the most part, the new individual can neither chose the degree of its individualization nor is it afforded the opportunity of self-determination, because, according to its respective social position and the safeguards at its disposal, it is subjected to the coercive power of heteronomy. The new individual is increasingly forced – whether it wants to or not – to give up existing collective ties and social networks and respond to the new demands with mobility and flexibility.

crash test dummy highlights the current desperate social situation and with the aid of installed high-tech surveillance systems and a special crash test method makes a yet to be defined sense of the body perceivable for the visitor. This is to be understood as an attempt to trace the lineaments of a future autonomous European identity and to indicate how the private forms the starting point for autonomy and self-determination.

It is planned to set up a crash test designed by artists and sociologists that brings this experience to life, translating the rapidly waning level of social safeguards into physical danger. As a proper crash test runs through a series of impacts, the goal here is to stage conflict situations and collect a large quantity of data on the subject’s emotional and social status as well as its identity in European societies undergoing transformation.

The key element and centerpiece of this art project for public space is the mobile studio Cocobello. It will be installed on a centrally located urban space in the respective city and is at once a base and starting point for several different performances, happenings, and excursions. By virtue of its design the Cocobello is itself a nomadic space or satellite, thus matching the vision of a new mobility architecturally and aesthetically. It is an ideal artistic instrument for research probes in public space. Equipped with a high-performance broadband internet connection, it acts both as a broadcast center as well as a projection screen. Local activists and citizens from the neighborhood collaborate directly on projects per wireless LAN and develop them in a neighborly collective. Other locations will be involved directly and live via video streaming. In addition, a large database can be set up. In the exterior area artists and activists will develop a scenario for the surrounding public space.

Discussion forums and performances which cannot be held in public space for production reasons and require a different aesthetic environment will take place at the respective venues of the participating organizations. Once again, the venues will be linked via internet and live video streaming to the external bio-utopia/ Cocobello. These activities shall initiate debate and analysis of the inflicted social wounds and fractures.

Artistic Implementation

The project crash test dummy is comprised of three different test series to be undertaken by a team made up of international and local artists, researchers, and activists in each of the participating cities. The single elements of the test series/art actions are:
more info: www.crashtestdummy.net