Cell phones and computer cables
Overall dimensions variable
Installation at Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, CA
Materials provided by GreenCitizen
exhibition: Jean Shin | Pause
Curated by Marc Mayer
Installation at Armory Art Fair: Platform 2023
Curated by Eva Respini
Thinking about the Bay Area as the historical epicenter of both tech and the environmental movement, Huddled Masses connects these two ideas by using e-waste as the material and the scholar’s rock, symbolizing a fetish for nature. Pause is an exhibition of and about technology, but without electricity, WiFi, flashing lights, moving images or sound.
Three sculptures Huddled Masses, made of obsolete cell phones are reminiscent of irregular, rough-hewn scholar’s rocks in Chinese art. She employs these forms that capture nature's essence while exposes the tension between nature and hardware. Embedded like fossils, this collection of obsolete technologies serves as an archive of twenty years of tech history, mapping our ever-growing digital footprint in the Anthropocene age, the geologic period defined by man’s impact on the planet.
Miles of old computer cables on the floor encircle these vertical forms, suggesting ocean waves or the raked gravel of Zen gardens. Finally, donated data devices are entombed by cords to create orb-like seating.
The installation aims to create a place to reflect — on toxic e-waste’s impact on the environment, on the planned obsolescence central to our consumer culture and on ways to reclaim ourselves in today’s attention economy.
