Eva & Franco Mattes: Fake Views

Special guests: Nora Al-Badri, Simon Denny, Do Not Research, Olia Lialina, Jill Magid, Jon Rafman

The Frankfurter Kunstverein presents the largest solo exhibition to date of media artists Eva & Franco Mattes. Using the pseudonym 0100101110101101.org, they have become international pioneers of the net art movement. Since the 1990s they have been exploring the phenomena generated by the internet. The concept art duo is known for their ironic appropriation of internet structures and critical examination of the social and political impact of internet culture on our society.

The title to the exhibition, Fake Views, addresses a range of issues. On the one hand, it refers to the phenomenon of fake news: manipulated news that is difficult to control on social networks and often serves commercial and ideological interests. On the other hand, the title Fake Views represents a digital practice: manipulated click counts for videos and images that are purchased from dubious providers to increase views and create the impression of public support.

Eva & Franco Mattes’ works employ the means and strategies of a contested attention economy that shape the global public sphere. The artists’ themes encompass various areas such as consumption of resources for processing data, unregulated working conditions on the internet, and the construction of absurd identities in social media.

Fake Views is part of a series of exhibitions at the Frankfurter Kunstverein that critically engage with themes of the digital society and democracy. As home to the world’s largest internet exchange point, DE-CIX, Frankfurt attracts an increasing number of international data centres to the city. The user data circulating within these centres is managed by private companies and operated in inaccessible high-security buildings, far from public access. Data has meanwhile become the most valuable resource of our time.

The internet is not an abstract space but rather exists concretely as software written by people and as hardware that transforms our cities. Eva & Franco Mattes utilise this materiality for their artworks and shed light on resulting abstract economic, social, and political phenomena. Their conceptual approach acts like a contrast agent applied to internet cultures: it enables them to illuminate the internet and its invisible infrastructure, both technical and human, from within.

The exhibition functions as a cohesive organism in which interconnected parts form a whole network, while each artwork examines a significant aspect of global online culture.

Curated by Franziska Nori.

We thank OBO Bettermann.