Jon Kessler | The Web | The New Yorker | The New Yorker | Jon Kessler | The Web
Mar 25 2013
M.C. Escher meets Eugene Debs in this madcap installation with sinister undertones. Visitors enter through a series of arches, designed to suggest the silver cases of MacBook Pros. A nearby monitor reveals an image of the viewer caught in an endless succession of screens—a digital hall of mirrors. A maze, made of panels displaying images of iPods and iPhones, contains hidden cameras that place portraits of gallerygoers into advertisements for the devices. Underlying the obvious messages—our every move is being subsumed by digital culture—is a subtler call of fair labor practices. The blue fabric that unfurls throughout the space issues from a hand-operated knitting machine, and miniature anti-suicide nets refer to the less than optimal working conditions at Apple’s factories in China. Through April 28. (Swiss Institute, 18 Wooster St. 212-925-2035.)
