Technologies create social media as “temporal objects”, that can have both separating and unifying power. They can steal our time, but they can intensify the synchronization of our minds and bodies. It might be considered as a well-known meaning of pharmakon – cure and poison at the same time

Marcos Lutyens presents Social pharmakon at Arte Boccanera Gallery. This body of work is based on research to do with inter-personal group communication on the internet and is a further development of Lutyens’ interest in our social interactions, as new technologies change the way we are.

Inspired by a dialogue born in the Reflection Room with Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev in dOCUMENTA (13), Lutyens explores electronic communication networks as an extension of the existing social world as we extend from one realm to the other and back again. The interchange between these two realities invites the visitor to consider the two different positions, and how we navigate between them.

The contrast between broadcast media – tv, radio – that uses one-way communication and social media, such as Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, or online networks has provoked a drastic change in the way we relate to each other, but more crucially it has impacted the way our psyche deals with the kaleidoscopic world around us.

In the first area of the gallery, which path is totally redefined, Lutyens has set up a kind of inner diary which tracks a process of extreme exposure to social media, using brainwave scanning equipment and robotic renderings. The next spaces relate to the visitor, who is, as always, the focal point of Lutyens’ research projects. These spaces explore the impact of push notifications as well as immerse the visitor in a smell-augmented journey through, into and beyond the social networks.

Released for the opening the exhibition catalogue, in Italian and English, with the dialogue Bakargiev – Lutyens, the curators essays, the works’ on show images.

Marcos Lutyens (London, 1964. Lives and works in Los Angeles). His research is based on consciousness and social dynamics, he has worked on large-scale projects that involve interactivity, the environment and new technologies. These interest led him to exhibit all over the world including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (2013), dOCUMENTA (13) in Kassel, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (2012), Centre Pompidou in Paris (2010), Royal Academy of Arts, London (2009).

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