KIOSK: Alexei Shulgin & Aristarkh Chernyshev
Alexei Shulgin & Aristarkh Chernyshev (RU)
Media Mirror, 2006
LCD display, acryl, custom electronics
Private Collection, Brussels
Launched in 2004 by Shulgin and Chernyshev, Electroboutique plays with the rethorics of the “new”, with the appeal of high-tech design and with some stereotypes usually used in reference to New Media Art: interactivity, immersion into the virtual, and the fluid, pliable nature of every media object. When the iPhone steals Mona Lisa's aura, Electroboutique plays a game in which a work of art is transformed into a techno fetish. Media Mirror, for example, is “a custom developed electronic mirror that moves a user to a different, 'fantastic' reality. The mirror is based on the newest unique electronic technologies that allow real-time processing of a moving image of high quality.” Media Mirror is typical of the new type of contemporary art objects proposed by Electroboutique: avant-garde art objects as technological products that are ready to be consumed here and now by anyone, combining reliable electronics with software art burnt into silicium.
Alexei Shulgin & Aristarkh Chernyshev (RU) are part of the KIOSK-gallery, curated by Yves Bernard and Domenico Quaranta.
