General Treatment by Tomislav Pokrajcic
Time to move on and finish my covering from Device_art 3.009 with Croatian artists. Excuse me for small delay in my blogging, but last week I had an opportunity to partake on Wearable Technology Workshop led by Abigail Stiers and Alexander Gross in Ljubljana (Slovenia). I just didn’t want to miss this opportunity to learn more on Arduino, soft circuits and electronic textiles. I will blog about it separately during the following weeks…
Tomislav Pokrajcic: General Treatment, photo taken from Kontejner
Tomislav Pokrajcic is a computer engineer hooked up to machines, interactive systems, flex-programming, GPS navigation, data visualization and cinematography. He’s a long-term member of curatorial collective Kontejner – bureau of contemporary art praxis, more precisely he’s engaged on the DIYARTLAB project that encourages the development of art practice at the intersection of science and technology.
Till now he has been involved as a software developer in the projects by Edita Matan – Lie Detector for those in Love (2006), Ines Krasic & Ivan Nikolic Lesh’s Banana Poetry (2006), and Martina Mezak’s Urania (2006).
Martina Mezak: Urania, production: DIYARTLAB project
His installation General Treatment (2009) deals with the passive aggressiveness of collective minds. It emphasizes different aspects of social manipulation we usually notice just after they happen with no possibility to come back anymore in order to correct things.
‘In a fun and discomforting manner, the installation deals with the position of the individual in the contemporary democratic system. The fact that you can vote for your leaders does not mean that you are enabled to change the model in which the system functions. Particularly with respect to the distribution of economic goods.’
Tomislav Pokrajcic: General Treatment, photo taken from Kontejner
‘Does this mean that democracy in its current state of evolution is just one great come-on and is there at all any publicly accessible mechanism for the redefinition of democracy?’
‘Do you have a powerful feeling that the elected government does everything it can to serve your interests and do you use any corrective mechanisms when you feel this is not the case? Do you have any effective recourse to hand at all?’
Tomislav Pokrajcic: General Treatment, photo taken from Kontejner
‘Try to keep a smile on your face while you read the following concepts: “government, holding, supervisory board, bank, member of parliament, parking fine, prime minister, minister, coalition partner, opposition, speaker, 65 million kuna, manager in a state owned corporation, special tax law…” Does this feeling have any associations for you?’ (Text excerpts by Kontejner taken from the official catalog)
