Der Greif #12: Blame The Algorithm (with Broomberg & Chanarin)

2019 | Print Publication, Exhibition, Display, Performance | Kunstinsel am Lenbachplatz, Stadtmuseum, Lothringer 13, Munich

Buy Der Greif Issue 12 by Broomberg & Chanarin

 

As guest editors of issue 12 of DER GREIF, Broomberg and Chanarin sent out a call for images that are too private, too quiet, too violent, too political, too subversive or too explicit to share online. They received an avalanche of submissions. Faced with a daunting task of editing the material they turned to a disgruntled former facebook employee who will remain anonymous. Broomberg and Chanarin decided to include both the GOOD and the BAD.

Issue 12 challenges our way of looking at and perceiving images. It asks if and how we may all be complicit to an ongoing commodification of imagery by using social media. Featuring the work of 85 photographers and artists, as well as excerpts from a four-hour interview with a former Facebook content moderator, conducted by Broomberg & Chanarin.

We were invited by the city of Munich to expand the concept of the issue. We presented a display of GOOD and BAD at Lenbachplatz in the heart of the city. For Munich Stadtmuseum, we created an installation of all corresponding magazine spreads of both the GOOD and the BAD sequence of images. Visitors were invited to leave their mark and make their own decisions: Is this image GOOD or BAD? Because of the explicit nature of some of the published images, the visitors also had to make a decision if they wanted to reveal the content or rather leave it censored.

During Fotodoks, we hosted an Oxford-style debate at Lothringer 13 during Fotodoks Munich, discussing the pros and cons of (image-) censorship online.

The debate took the form of presentations between 2-4 minutes per person. One team arguing FOR and the other one AGAINST censorship online. The GOOD team argued for a healthy amount of censorship, as the web is a safe, unregulated space for everyone to express/share/question/surf. The BAD team argued against a healthy amount of censorship needed online to protect readers.