Architecture of Hidden Activity

Where does the digital touch the physical world? What landscapes does the digital bring into being, and what does the illusion of digital immateriality mean? The group exhibition Architecture of Hidden Activity turns its attention to those physical infrastructures that sustain our digital lives and yet largely remain concealed within the background of technical systems. Through these structures, data circulates continuously on an almost unimaginable scale, directing flows of goods, financial transfers, critical infrastructures, and the administration of societies.

These processes, however, depend on material conditions: metals, rare earths, chemical substances, oil, gas, water, and plastics shape data centres, transmission masts, cables laid in the depths of the oceans, and a global satellite network. Contrary to the notion of an immaterial digital realm, digital infrastructure leaves profound traces in ecosystems and landscapes.

The artists engage with these interrelations and translate the complex processes into installation, object, sculpture, video, and photography. Emma Charles leads viewers cinematically into underground data centres and urban architectures that physically anchor digital life. Marie Rief melts the pages of a patent file for a touchscreen display into glass panels, addressing the isolation of access to information. Karin Sander, with works such as Map Icon, reflects on the visualisation formats of platforms such as Google Maps and reconsiders the relationship between space, artwork, and viewer. Stefanie Seufert transforms the everyday gesture of scrolling into analogue photograms that subversively undermine the male-dominated cult of genius in art history. Silja Yvette elevates ‘packaging bodies’ photographically onto a symbolic pedestal while, in Tools of Modernity, sculpturally reflecting on the life cycle of technological device casings within the context of the photographic studio.

The works reveal how values and resources emerge, are secured, and are transformed in the digital age. Together, they unfold a narrative about the materiality of the digital and the interfaces between economy, technology, and everyday life.

Funded within the programme Presentation of Contemporary Visual Arts of the Senate Department for Culture and Social Cohesion

Artistic direction: Marie Rief and Silja Yvette
Curatorial assistance: Tatjana Rotfuß