2024
16 blocks : 90*90*225cm, Wood, Blueback
Contract : A4 Laser print and hand writting
Selfportrait : Baryta print mounted and framed
The process was simple: the performer (the artist) would engage with strangers in the street by simply winking at them in order to generate a human connection. Anyone who winked back would automatically also become a participant in the performance, their photograph serving as a record of the connection made. The performance culminated in the participant signing a contract.
Through Wink Piece, Lignier elicits reflection and dialogue on the nature of human connection in our increasingly digitized world. He asks us to review the authenticity of our interactions, inviting us to consider how we behave online. The artist does not seek to criticize virtual interaction but rather to challenge it or the individual user-by encouraging reflection on how each of us navigates social media and networking platforms: how do we act online? And, as a result,how does our behavior change offline? ls it the tools or our behavior that sets the tone? Who is pulling the strings that determine our actions? And finally, what does what we see in our feeds say about us?
Text by Georgina Casparis
Photography
2023
Amazon safe, drill, analog paper framed
Variable dimension
Performative installation featuring an Amazon home safe, immerses the performer in a meticulous task within the safe—methodically drilling a hole. A sheet of sensitive photographic paper is display inside. The paper is capturing the result, a photograph of the performer. This black box becomes a metaphor for photography in our digital era, drawing bridges between the camera obscura—a darkened room with a small hole at one side through which an image is projected onto a wall opposite the hole—and our relationship with visual media within the digital society. It prompts reflection on the ways in which our perception of security and privacy may be compromised in the pursuit of capturing and sharing images. The project sheds light on the thin line between technology and human expression. It invites us to consider our place as both creators and subjects in a world where the boundaries of image-making and privacy are continually redefined.
Performance
Various Gorilla Suits
Eleven prints and one mirror
Inkjet Glossy Print
Chrome framed
24*30cm
Primitive Action
Site specific video performance
Video looped with sound
00:06:14
Beamer, screen, loud speakers
Dog Stereo Cat
Performance
Duration: 3:28:20
Flightcase, slideshow, microphone, speakers, amplifier, beamer
Container
White box, neons, plinth, book, screens, speakers
Book
White Cell
18x24cm
1498 pages
Videos looped with sound
AAAAH : 00:30:00
Blackdot : 00:06:27
Eye Cleaning : 00:04:26
Text by Bruno Ceschel
2022
Colony of Messor Barbarus, Plexiglass Box, print on edible paper and ink, water, seeds.61*45*6cm
Performative ecosystem that encompasses humans, machines, and animals. It delves into the intricate dynamics of a colony of ants engaged in a meticulous task within a framed installation: precisely cutting out an image of a coin from a human hand. This tableau serves as a metaphor for the multifaceted processes of image segmentation and the evolving nature of work in our digital era. Drawing bridges between the 18th-century Mechanical Turk, a deceptive automaton mimicking human chess-playing, and the Amazon Mechanical Turk, a platform facilitating microtasking for training autonomous systems, Crowdsourcing, in its expanded scope, becomes a critique of our collective behaviour within digital society. Display our unconscious contributions to the labor for Big Tech companies, prompting contemplation on our digital interactions and roles in a technologically driven world. The project provocatively challenges viewers to reassess their involvement in digital ecosystems, urging reflection on the complex processes concealed behind seemingly simple tasks. By emphasising the parallels between human, machine, and ant labor, it invites us to consider our place in a world where the lines between species and technologies blur.
Installation
2022
Fujiflex print mounted on aluminium box
70*100cm
A hole in a metallic tube, a text emerges on the back, not intentionally placed, revealing the artist’s profound reflection on his experiences working for Amazon Mechanical Turk.The image an emotional journey within the digital workforce. The metallic tube, with its industrial aesthetic, takes on symbolic significance, representing the rigid and often dehumanizing structures of online labor platforms. The hole in the tube serves as a poignant focal point, suggesting a breach or rupture in the seamless facade of automated work.The text inscribed on the image offers a raw and honest glimpse into the artist’s emotions during his engagement with Amazon Mechanical Turk, a complex blend of frustration, dehumanization, and a paradoxical sense of liberation. It prompts viewers to reflect on the blurred boundaries between human and machine, the impact of digital platforms on individual autonomy, and the harsh realities of unpaid labor in the gig economy.
Photography
2021
camera booth, rats, prints
Based on the experiment analysis of behaviour developed by psychologist Dr. Burrhus Frederic Skinner in the 1950’s, Selfie
Rats deploys a three-stages experiment with a group of rodents. Trained with a sugar distribution system connected to a camera, a group of rats produces images of themselves by interacting with the photographic apparatus. At first driven by the trained compulsion to eat sugar, they eventually just playfully snap pictures. By echoing addictive behaviour engineered by social media companies to keep users captive, Lignier humorously addresses what cultural theorist Yves Citton calls ecology of attention, a coercive system, which commodifies our attentiveness with a mechanism based on sheer pleasure.
Text by Claus Gunti
Installation