The new exhibition at the Kunsthalle introduces visitors to the concept of dataism and shows how it permeates our everyday lives, practically every step we take. The exhibition focuses on Albert-László Barabási, an internationally renowned network researcher whose research examines the functioning of networks that emerge from data.
Over the past five years, Barabási has embarked on large-scale fine art and painting projects, organized an entire workshop (Barabási Atelier) around himself, and spent three entire summers in Budapest creating a unique series of painting projects, each of which was based on some form of data or data analysis.
The exhibition explores in detail the relationship between Barabási Lab and Barabási Atelier: how Barabási experiments with coordinating scientific group work and the functioning of the creative workshop, who works with him in the “art” and who in the “science” environment, and how these work processes intermingle.
The exhibition space will feature 12 paint rollers, which the members of Atelier designed and developed over three years as visual tools for dataism. The exhibition also presents Barabási’s main inspiration for painting, the legacy of his grandfather, who worked as a house painter in Transylvania using traditional paint rollers, and whose work and technique inspired the Atelier’s contemporary painting practice. The rollers provide an overview of the three cycles presented in the exhibition: Fake News, Banned Books, Numbers – each of which processes a separate set of data related to contemporary culture, revealing different aspects of dataism.
The exhibition also presents Barabási’s bestseller The Formula, in which he analyzes the value of network connections in the art world and strategies for building a career. What makes the exhibition unique is that Barabási – “like a good scientist, experimenting on himself” – applies the principles described in the book to his own artistic career, thus becoming both a researcher and a creator.