The second edition of the exhibition Chronicles of the Future Superheroes, curated by Anca Mihulet, is on view at MNAC.
“Chronicles of the Future Superheroes, a project initiated as a curatorial research in 2018, acts as a device aiming to analyse the function of art in relation to a young audience that is looking for answers to questions about the passage of time and aging, the future of the planet, the relationship with the unworldly or the balance between the local and the global, bringing into dialogue two particular geographical and cultural realms – Southeast Europe and Southeast Asia. The first edition of the project was showcased in 2021 at Kunsthalle Bega in Timișoara, following up the awarding of Bega Art Prize 2019 to curator Anca Mihuleț.
The idea behind the exhibition originated from the book Danielle: Chronicles of a Superheroine by the American inventor Ray Kurzweil, which follows a young woman’s efforts to solve major global problems through knowledge and technology. Written from a dual perspective — that of a futuristic thinker and that of a woman in the making — Danielle: Chronicles of a Superheroine functions as a textbook that helps us position ourselves in the face of things to come and for which we must be prepared for; from migration to global warming, from various forms of economic competitiveness to emotional transformation and the ability to share. The project Chronicles of the Future Superheroes seeks to explain, but also to complicate our perception about the future, offering two distinctive ways of interpreting the subject – one that flows from the past to the future and one that is anchored in a present of hopes and uncertainties.
The fourteen artists selected to converse with Danielle start out from the interest of exploring the unknown or from the idea of the game, aiming to extrapolate personal experiences in relation to the future, outlining the idea of a meta-community located outside of the global dystopia. The discourses presented in the exhibition are the result of hybrid practices, bordering visuality, architecture, choreography, engineering, performance and writing. Most of the works have been specially produced for the exhibition and they follow specific conceptual tracks – the relation with childhood memories, the dissolution of the past while facing a fragmented future or the examination of new forms of existence, at both material and digital levels.”
The exhibition can be visited on the 3rd floor of the museum until March 31st, 2024.
