"Hallucinations of the Normal" Opening // Friday 20th January 2017 // 8 — 10pm

Maybe it all started with the use of the Chorus in ancient tragedies. The set-up is brilliant: to have a play that preemptively incorporates the sentiment of the public. A play that does not situate itself outside of the spectator, but already negotiates their attitude.

This mechanism can be extrapolated: be it an obnoxious puppet that speaks from the ventriloquist's stomach, be it the pirates and princesses of theme parks acting out the lowest denominator of collective reveries. Somehow we can suspend our disbelief and pretend not to be addressed by his master's voice. We are thrilled by this tension, of being presented with something that does not lie outside of us, but presumingly answers to our own feelings; the perversion of being given what you truly wish for.

How does this trick of supposedly 'direct representation' function? Instead of taking a critical (a term the art world desperately clings to) distance, what are the possibilities of the staged voicing of the communis opinio? This exhibition assembles different instances where our desire is 'simply' reflected. It is a choreography of moments where the voice of the public is artificially staged.

Artists:

Athanasios Gatos

Jeff Koons

Olga Evangelidou

Renzo Martens

Theofanis Dalezios

Varvaras

The exhibition is conceived by Laurens Otto, Snehta curator-in-residence. It has been funded by the Mondriaan Fund.

Opening // Friday 20th January 2017 // 8 — 10pm Open // Saturday 21st and Sunday 22nd January 2017 // 4 — 8pm

SNEHTA

I. Drosopoulou 47, Kypseli 11257, Athens