Cloud
Matthias Pitscher (DE)
“Sometimes I forget that the internet is a real place. It exists everywhere on the planet, connecting computers with cables and invisible lights. Only when I look at the rooftops I see these bodies of steel, and I wonder: what if I could see the clouds created by our online activities? Would I be more mindful of where my data ends up? Would I be scared of electrosmog and pollution?”
Matthias Pitscher’s ephemeral installation Cloud makes the infrastructure of mobile networks visible by shrouding their physical structures in mist for a moment. The metaphor of the cloud is taken literally focussing the transmission towers that connect directly to global data centres. The artwork, which appears irregularly, depending on data turnover for that cell site, is a materialization of an otherwise invisible flow of information. The installation draws people’s eyes to the rooftops, thoughts about aesthetics, fears and functionality of our information infrastructures are inevitably triggered. Pitscher invites us to look up into the clouds and daydream of all the packages floating through the air.
Matthias Pitscher (* 1991) was born in a small and quiet German town. In 2012 he began studying media art and design at the Bauhaus University in Weimar. In addition to deepening his graphical skills, his interests shifted towards contemporary art and especially conceptual art, where he found a new way of doing playful philosophy. With his alter ego “Pitscher” he started to build his own interactive installations and social experiments in public space. His performative actions were further expanded in 2015 at the University of Ulster in Belfast. Currently he is studying Interface Cultures at the University of Arts Linz, where his interests lie in using, examining and generating stories of artificial intelligence. His work balances on the edge of irony and sincerity leaving the interpretation to the user, and was shown at Keck Kiosk in Basel, Ars Electronica Festival in Linz, Xie Zilong Photography Museum in Changsha, space is a space in Berlin, Digital Arts Festival in Athens, Spinnerei Leipzig, Node Festival in Frankfurt am Main, transmediale Berlin and Museum of Modern Art in Odessa, amongst others.