02- INNER CARBON01 - MAMMOTH TECHNOLOGY00- PRIMORDIUM
InformationExhibitions
WritingsSpeaking
Interviews
Mammoth Technology Manifesto
It takes on forms and materials that are familiar, yet arises out of an alien spirit.
Its existence presumes and proves the existence of other technology philosophies.
It grows in dark and damp places, in crevices and caves.
It does not beg for attention. Only those with an open ontology may discover its existence.
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Mammoth technologies are everywhere in the world. They went extinct a long time ago. They are being revived. They exist in pieces underneath the soil all around the globe. Every civilization arose out of a world of mammoth technologies.
They are not concerned with being real: whether they existed in the past, are practiced in the present, or will be realized in the future. They draw images that defy the linear idea of progress.
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Mammoth Technology is a theory and practice of esoteric progress.
Through MT, practitioners emancipate the modern people from the existing paradigms around the perspective of progress, which is also always about a view of history, which always influences the actions and decision-makings of today.
MT is not merely magical thinking, but beyond analytical methods.
MT is not merely the unknown, but the unknowable.
MT is a state of intentional illusion, intentional chaos, intentional dreaming, of ways of knowing.
MT is the black spot in the white swirl of the Taiji diagram, the diagram of supreme polarity. It is the shadow to the bright light of progress, but it also loves and cares about progress.
MT is practicing science on historicity. It is performing scientific surgery on the formation of history.
Mammoth Technology is probably modernity staring back at itself.
Tale of the Mammoth Goddess
Animation short
8 minute 11 seconds
Written, directed, filmed, animated, edited by Wendi Yan
Music by Bang Klang (AP Bergeron & Leander Knust)
Inspired by her research on synthetic biology, mammoth de-extinction and the historical thread of catastrophic thinking, Wendi Yan created Tale of the Mammoth Goddess to draw out a broad historical arc about mammoth as a cultural species—a critical witness to human civilizations.
Using Unreal Engine, AI generated voiceover and 3D software, Yan mixes in folkloric elements in worldbuilding, presenting a mammoth goddess who involuntarily sits through rituals, who is lazy and perhaps aloof, who escapes the duty imposed on her to live a life she wants. The mammoth collects images and objects of wooly mammoths and asian elephants to assemble her ancestral altar, which also features many “Magic: The Gathering” cards and a pastel pink human anatomy chart carpet. Through infusing this mammoth with character “flaws” and unexpected traits, Yan subverts the sublime narrative around prehistoric megafauna.
Tale of the Mammoth Goddess explores a nonhuman perspective in a rather human-centric story: if the resurrected mammoth is a biotechnical object created to serve humans’ goal of preserving the tundra ecosystem, what would the mammoth offer, if she had memories from 10,000 years ago? This piece of wild fiction attempts to make sense of the new states of nature and technology we have already been living in.
A Mammoth Gathering
virtual workshop
Support by X Museum
Mammoth Technology is a theory and practice of esoteric progress. It is performing surgical experiments on historicity. Temporarily relocating to a different metabolic rhythm, and shifting the collective attention to the geological scale, participants will join Wendi in honouring the unknowable and the unstable in the technological possibilities of the modern present, in the crevices of progress.
Networked Worlds Research Memo
collaborative research
Featured projects:
Morphogenic Angels: Chapter 1 by @_keiken
Post Office by @post____office
Waluigis Purgatory by @dmstfctn
Special Fish by @expression_and_sites
Into The Void by @limboaccra
The Orfelia @theorfelial
LIOS Labs @lios_labs
Open Spring by @zzyw000
Tale of the Mammoth Goddess by @wendiyan
When We Love by @hotemogf
Co-matter team:
Ciara O'Shea @cicicici_oooo, production
Kesia Inkersole @kesinkersole, research & open call lead
Nelya Rosa @nelyarosa, research & ideation
Paloma Moniz @palomasmooch , visual identity
Riccardo Righi @riccardorighi, Vreni Knoepfler, design
Nick Houde, Alice Sweitzer @pearlywhites___ , editing
Severin Matusek, research lead & creative direction
Research memo on worlding as a creative strategy in the early 21st century.
What is worlding?
Rather than escaping into imaginary universes, worlding has become a vital strategy for artists and creatives to experiment with alternative futures and render the conditions of the present visible in order to change them.
The 60 page, free-to-download memo is a journey into 10 worlds that use a variety of formats and technologies – from AI to blockchain to photogrammetry, 3D engines and ancient rituals – to prototype new models for creating reality.
Worlds are futures we can believe in.
The projects were selected from an Open Call, hosted by @WeTransfer earlier this year, that resulted in more than 380 submissions from around the world. Thank you to everyone who submitted their work!
Networked Worlds is the third part of Networked Culture, a series of publications in collaboration with @WeTransfer that explore the effects of networked technologies on the creative process.
Synthesist’s Table
Installation
glass, mirror, coal, tubing, ultrasonic gel, gum rubber, film reel, vellum
size variable
Synthesist’s Table imagines the knowledge production system of another world, in which the experimental instruments are organic and organ-like, and the work station operates as a diagrammatic body. Beings made of glass on the table imply forms of consciousness that exist in a vastly different scale of time. Glass vessels placed on glass mirrors raised and balanced by coal refer to heat and the technology of temperature.
Frozen Ink
Glass
Hairy Rug
Utility mat
The only piece made before the conception of the show, Hairy Rug could be seen as a subconscious entrance into the artist’s exploration in the material exchange between the artificial and the organic.
AI, Hand Me Artifacts from My Dreams
AI-Generated images. Inkjet print on canvas
Dimensions variable