Gabriela Schutz
DISconnect
1 –30 Sept 2017
Gabriela Schutz is fascinated and apprehensive with the way technology, information and communication are increasingly shaping our life. She is disturbed by the vast amount of time we are spending on our phones, physically present yet mentally elsewhere.
We communicate, search for information, shop, listen to music, read books, play and much more, all on our phones. Icons and symbols replace text to simplify and speed things up. We flick through endless scrolls of images and text on social media platforms, barely remembering what we saw due to the volume of information. There is a tendency to remember less and less as we can access everything on external hard discs and in ‘The Cloud’. All this we are doing alone.
Through the meticulous and old fashioned techniques of drawing, painting, etching and sculpture, Schutz is trying to counter the speed and superficial nature of the way we access data. Her aim is to replace it with slowness and deep observation while embracing the visual language of the digital sphere. For example, in the vertical 10 meter long drawing ‘Blog 3’, Schutz was working strictly on location, from observation, while using the format of social media platforms.
‘DISconnect’ invites the viewer to pause and reflect upon this age of information, where the the speed of change escalates so fast and the future seems unfathomable.
Gabriela Schutz is an Israeli artist living and working in London. She has exhibited her work widely both here and internationally.
Gallery talk: Saturday 23rd September, 12pm.
Michelle Legare