BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//wp-events-plugin.com//7.4.7//EN TZID:Europe/London X-WR-TIMEZONE:Europe/London BEGIN:VEVENT UID:455@artinliverpool.com DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20151211T110000 DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20151211T180000 DTSTAMP:20151206T221121Z URL:https://www.artinliverpool.com/events/fact-follow/ SUMMARY:FACT: FACT: Opening FOLLOW DESCRIPTION:FOLLOW\n\nFeaturing work by LaBeouf\, Rönkkö &\; Turner\, Cécile B. Evans\, Constant Dullaart and more.\n\nBe the first to see FACT 's new exhibition\, when the galleries will be open all day for this very special opening event\nFREE\n\nLater on\, celebrate the exhibition opening with us at Buyers Club\, where we'll be holding an afterparty from 21.00 - late. Click here to book tickets.\n\nExhibition runs Friday 11 December 2015 – Sunday 21 February 2016\n\nFOLLOW FACT\n\nIn a world where we use Instagram and Twitter ‘likes’ to assess who and what is important\, t he major new exhibition Follow will ask what impact the internet is really having on our concept of ‘reality’\, and how we think about ourselves \, our idols and those around us.\n\nNew commissions\, research and existi ng work will present a wide range of experiences and views of image\, self -branding\, identity\, sharing and micro-celebrity within the context of a life lived online. Exhibition highlights include new work by LaBeouf\, R önkkö &\; Turner\, Cécile B. Evans\, Debora Delmar Corp.\, Joe Orr\, Ant Hamlyn\, Aram Bartholl\, Louise Adkins\, Simon Whybray\, and Candice Jacobs\, and restaged work by Constant Dullaart and Kurdwin Ayub.\n\nThe d iverse selection of approaches to the theme include artist Cécile B. Evan s’ new video installation Commercials (It's not possible\, it's real)\, which takes the form of commercials in a campaign\, reflecting the real-ti me absurdity of contemporary marketing. The videos will be showcased both at FACT as well as online\, offering audiences various ways to experience the piece. Another example is the online performance High Retention\, Slow Delivery (2014) by artist Constant Dullaart\, who purchased 2.5 million I nstagram followers\, which he then distributed amongst a cross section of the art-world Instagram profiles\, highlighting the complexities of assess ing value through 'Likes' or 'Follows' that can literally be bought. Follo w will also showcase new work by art collective LaBeouf\, Rönkkö &\; Turner\, made up of Shia LaBeouf\, Nastja Säde Rönkkö\, and Luke Turner \, who previously have created installations and performances across a var iety of platforms including social media\, art galleries and red carpet ev ents.\n\nThe Follow Resource Space will feature a collection of journals\, books\, magazines\, videos and games selected by the exhibition curators\ , situating Kim Kardashian’s Selfish book next to writing by thinkers an d artists such as Hito Steyerl and Rob Horning.\n\nAlongside the exhibitio n\, Follow will present workshops\, events and drop-in activities inviting visitors to discuss\, and gain skills and knowledge about\, the online pl atforms we use daily\, but rarely critically think about. Most prominently \, FACT’s experimental workshop space FACTLab will turn into a pop-up pr oduction studio\, complete with green screen\, lighting rig and basic film ing and editing equipment\, providing a space for critical experimentation around the way we use social media.\n\nThe studio is inspired by the YouT ube Creator Spaces around the world that are open to an elite group of You Tubers with thousands of subscribers\, with the difference that FACTLab wi ll be an open space free for all to use - regardless of position in the so cial media hierarchy. Artist Louise Adkins has created a series of worksho ps to take place in the space\, specifically looking into themes of online identity\, celebrity and the reasons why we produce online videos in the ways we do.\n\nAmy Jones\, co-curator of Follow with Lesley Taker\, says: “Fame is no longer an aspirational dream and celebrities are no longer c reated on the exclusive space of the red carpet\, but on our Twitter feeds and Facebook walls. Follow looks into the ways we commodify\, advertise a nd constantly curate our own image as our ‘product’\, and explores how this can influence our sense of self.”\n\nExhibition highlights include \n\nArt collective LaBeouf\, Rönkkö &\; Turner is made up of Shia LaB eouf (US)\, Nastja Säde Rönkkö (Finland)\, and Luke Turner (UK)\, who h ave been working collaboratively over the last two years producing works\, installations and performances which relate broadly to the concept of met amodernism. These projects have appeared in\, and been created using\, a v ariety of spaces and platforms including social media\, art galleries and red carpet events.\n\nCécile B. Evans (US/Belgium) is interested in the d igital circulation of human ideologies\, using the content generated aroun d them them as source material. Commissioned by FACT and Metal\, Evans’ new video installation (It's not possible\, it's real)\, showcased both at FACT and online\, reflects the real-time absurdity of contemporary market ing\, which awkwardly incorporates social issues\, dry humour\, and an int ense deployment of emotion\, striving to simultaneously shape\, and be sha ped by\, viewers.\n\nConstant Dullaart (Netherlands) works primarily with the Internet as an alternative space of presentation and (mis)representati on. Documentation of the online performance High Retention\, Slow Delivery (2014) will be presented as part of Follow\, looking at the problems of v alidation through 'Likes' or 'Follows' and considering the commercial and capitalist impact when you can literally buy your followers.\n\nDebora Del mar Corp. (Mexico) examines the ways in which commodity culture structures our everyday life by reconfiguring the production\, branding and merchand ising techniques of global corporations. In 2009\, Delmar adopted the name Debora Delmar Corp. for the distribution of her work to reflect on the st ate of 21st-century living\, and later found the Debora Delmar Corp. logo being commandeered by a chain of hospitals in Los Angeles and tattooed ont o the hips of supermodels Cara Delevigne and Jourdan Dunn. Follow will pre sent a project where Delmar questions who came up with this logo first\, a nd if it even matters. Debora Delmar Corp body transfers will also be avai lable as part of the installation\, allowing visitors to become DDC repres entatives.\n\nKurdwin Ayub’s (Iraq) video installation sexy (2013) shows Ayub watching\, copying and interpreting pop star Miley Cyrus’ music vi deo We Can’t Stop. Not having the tools to become an international star - no supporting rapper\, no entourage of models - to add to her attraction \, the film portrays the artist’s struggle to imitate the commercialized cliché of an erotic role model.\n\nJoe Orr’s (UK) sculptures\, perform ances and installations use humour to undermine the ‘seriousness’ of t he art world\, and the authority of the art object. Orr traces his willing ness to poke fun at his own work and contemporary art to visits he made wi th his father to art galleries as a young boy\, when he would be encourage d to laugh at many of the works on display. For Follow\, Orr will explore artistic production by combining traditional sign writing techniques with the platform many contemporary artists now use to disseminate their work\; Instagram.\n\nAnt Hamlyn (UK)\, FACT and Liverpool Hope University Produc tion Resident\, has created The Boost Project for Follow\, exploring how t he power of social media can give us a temporal state of appreciation. An inflating orb\, symbolizing the sense of self-worth that we can feel after receiving ‘likes’ online\, will grow in size if liked through Faceboo k\, Tweeted about or Hashtagged via Instagram. If the orb is ignored\, ove r time it will subtly deflate and fade into the background of our lives.\n \nMark Shepard (US) is an artist\, architect and researcher whose practice addresses new social spaces and structures of network cultures. Moritz St efaner (Germany) works as a “truth and beauty operator” on the crossro ads of data visualization\, information aesthetics and user interface desi gn. Their project False Positive (2014) is a performance and workshop\, wh ich exposes the hidden processes by which personal data can be collected a nd used to make “data-portraits” of users\, aiming to catalyze the pub lic debate surrounding the politics underlying mobile communication.\n\nTh rough public interventions and public installations\, Aram Bartholl (Germa ny) examines how the digital driven reality impacts the city every day lif e. For Follow\, Bartholl has adapted a Penny Press\, typically found at to urist destinations across the globe\, to generate souvenirs of the Interne t in form of pressed pennies. The work questions the physical status of th e Internet while encouraging us to re-think our understanding of the insep arable online-offline relation we live in today.\n\nLouise Adkins is an ar tist based in Manchester and a senior lecturer at the School of Art. Adkin s’ practice explores themes of appropriation and the re enactment of cul tural references and events\, incorporating new media\, dance\, music\, sp ort and film as a way of reading and understanding recent histories. She i s interested in the relationship between live performance and digital medi a and how new technologies can foster alternative narrative within perform ance-based practice. For Follow\, Adkins has created a series of workshops which look into themes of online identity\, celebrity and the reasons why we produce online videos in the ways we do\, allowing visitors to gain sk ills and knowledge about the online platforms which we use daily\, but rar ely critically think about.\n\nSimon Whybray’s (UK) design for Follow’ s brand identity centers around one main character. Shot by Diamond Wright \, this unnamed character (modelled by Cora Delaney) demonstrates the tens ion between personal identity\, advertising and branding through a series of provocative and challenging images. Based in London and Los Angeles\, W hybray has been working in brand-design for a decade. With his company HYP ER®\, he runs international scene-birthing club night JACK and presents h is monthly show RADIO JACK on NTS in London.\n\nFemininity\, serenity and tranquillity\, the promise of paradise and perfection\; Candice Jacobs’ (UK) work as an artist illustrates her intimate knowledge with the world o f advertising\, of brand identity and of creating an unattainable lifestyl e ideal to promote continually self-sustaining desire. For Follow\, Jacobs will communicate the concepts of the show through a 3D exhibition design\ , which explores the meaninglessness of aspiration through an array of see mingly luxurious surfaces and textures.\n\nFACT’s Follow collaborators a re Metal\, Liverpool Hope University and Picturehouse. Supporters are Conn ecting Cities through the EU Culture Programme\, CANVAS and Goethe Institu t.\n\n \; ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://www.artinliverpool.com/wp-content/upload s/2015/11/fact-follow-id-1.jpg LOCATION:FACT\, 88 Wood Street\, Liverpool\, L1 4DQ\, Liverpool\, United Ki ngdom GEO:53.402564;-2.978127 X-APPLE-STRUCTURED-LOCATION;VALUE=URI;X-ADDRESS=88 Wood Street\, Liverpool\ , L1 4DQ\, Liverpool\, United Kingdom;X-APPLE-RADIUS=100;X-TITLE=FACT:geo: 53.402564,-2.978127 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:Europe/London X-LIC-LOCATION:Europe/London BEGIN:STANDARD DTSTART:20151025T010000 TZOFFSETFROM:+0100 TZOFFSETTO:+0000 TZNAME:GMT END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE END:VCALENDAR