Friday 20 July 2018

for whom the bell tolls

Currently on display in the operating theatre of Berlin’s Humboldt University, Hyperallergic’s reflection upon experiencing the bleak and forlorn installation of Crystelle Vu’s and Julian Oliver’s “Extinction Gong” is certainly worth your consideration.
A litotic tribute to mark the death of an entire species, a Chao gong decorated with an hourglass annihilation symbol clangs out a sobering, echoing crash every nineteen minutes, calculated to be the average frequency that the Earth loses an insect, animal or plant—known or undiscovered—due to the intervention of humans. Attempts to upgrade the automaton to name and eulogise species as they pass has run into technical difficulties, mounting insult, certainly—but somehow fitting with humanity’s rapaciousness.