Six degrees of freedom
A project of the photography class of the HFBK under the direction of Prof. Adam Broomberg in cooperation with students of the Digital Graphics class (Prof. Christoph Knoth/Prof. Konrad Renner), the Movement Lab of Barnard College / Columbia University (Guy de Lancey), the Goethe Institute Paris and the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation.
The idea to collaborate on a digital publication began soon after lockdown was announced and the possibility of opening our physical exhibition at The Goethe-Institute space in Paris became impossible.
Instead of creating a “digital exhibition” for Goethe Institute Paris we want to use this opportunity of having the time and resources to explore the conceptual, the moral, the cultural and sensual impact of working in a digital space. Instead of separating, de-contextualizing the work and presenting it in its digitized version on a digital white cube wall, the projects wants to emphasize the conflicts that arise when forced into the same virtual space.
We don’t have to be quiet; we don’t have to even be respectful of the work, we can touch the work, destroy it. Similarly the works themselves are not obliged to remain stable and inoffensive like their modernist ancestors. In this container works can alter in size or shape, they interact with one another, and they can speak to you.
This is an amazing opportunity to explore what the migration of photography into the digital world means. What do we lose, what do we gain? What are the moral and ethical implications? How do we not repeat the same mistakes we seem to make with each new technology? How can we include people and information that traditional formats have not allowed to date?
Their practical and theoretical knowledge of the possibilities, limitations and problematics of this space we will be inhabiting, will be invaluable.
Apart from offering us access to state-of-the art technology, like motion capture, they also offer collaboration with artists from very diverse backgrounds with a range of different and immediate (socio-political) concerns.