MMCA
About the Exhibition
PROJECT HASHTAG 2021 reflected concerns of Gen Z and millennial artists regarding online experiences and environments that are heavily influencing and rapidly reshaping our human values in the post-pandemic era. PROJECT HASHTAG 2021 presented two teams—After New Order… and The Duck Among Us. They observed how traditional human values are expanded or distorted in the virtual space and how "the web" has brought about new social rules, ethical standards, and expression of new emotions and desire.
After New Order…asked if utopian qualities we had expected from the early internet such as freedom, openness, and ethical values have been realized in the current online world and reviews directions we should take to promote them. The team explored the problems both from the ethical and environmental perspective through seven projects in forms of website, installation, workshop, and publication #KoreaWebsitePrize, #AltMMCA, and #MicroDataCenter. With these virtual and physical worlds they’ve constructed, the team aimed to ensure web accessibility, independence from dominating platforms, and eco-friendliness.
The Duck Among Us focused on subculture by actively engaging with online platforms and looked into human desires that are expressed openly within anonymous subculture contexts. Artists presented pixel ducks as a symbol of the cycle of desire, consumption, and death as they are easily consumed and discarded. Inspired by music videos, web novels, and Instagram posts, the project brought these online imaginations into the real world through performances, installations, and web novels including #WhosTheDuckAmongUs? and #IFeelLikeEatingYouToday.
The official website projecthashtag.net connected with the ongoing online projects that expanded from the exhibition and generated transmuting contexts by sorting the artworks with hashtags provided by the artists. Ushered by the hashtags, users found further details, processes, and stories about the artworks.
About After New Order…
After New Order… asked if utopian qualities we had expected from the early internet such as freedom, openness, and ethical values have been realized in the current online world and reviews directions we should take to promote them. The team explored the problems both from the ethical and environmental perspective through seven projects in forms of website, installation, workshop, and publication #KoreaWebsitePrize, #AltMMCA, and #MicroDataCenter. With these virtual and physical worlds they’ve constructed, the team aimeds to ensure web accessibility, independence from dominating platforms, and eco-friendliness.
About The Duck Among Us
The Duck Among Us focused on subculture by actively engaging with online platforms and looked into human desires that are expressed openly within anonymous subculture contexts. Artists presented pixel ducks as a symbol of the cycle of desire, consumption, and death as they are easily consumed and discarded. Inspired by music videos, web novels, and Instagram posts, the project brought these online imaginations into the real world through performances, installations, and web novels including #WhosTheDuckAmongUs? and #IFeelLikeEatingYouToday.
About the Program
PROJECT HASHTAG
PROJECT HASHTAG is a five-year initiative that fosters the next generation of Korean artists through an annual open call. The program provides support for the creation and presentation of experimental artworks that push boundaries. Reflecting the fluid and open nature of the hashtag symbol (#), this comprehensive program empowers emerging talents to engage in imaginative interdisciplinary collaborations that redefine artistic expression. The program embraces diverse fields, including painting, sculpture, new media, film, design, architecture, music, dance, linguistics, biology, physics, poetry, fiction, and hypertext. Annually, two creator teams are selected for a grant, an MMCA Residency Changdong studio space, and a showcase at MMCA Seoul. Launched in 2019, this program stems from MMCA and Hyundai Motor's decade-long partnership, dedicated to broadening Korean contemporary art's reach and impact.
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