#KönigDigital: The international group show „better off online“ is presented by @koeniggalerie as part of @arselectronica. Enter the exhibition by typing ars.webb.game in your browser.

https://www.koeniggalerie.com/exhibitions/31662/world-wide-webb/
https://ars.webb.game/

“It is increasingly necessary to be able to think new technologies in different ways, and to be critical of them, in order to meaningfully participate in that shaping and directing“, writes James Bridle in his book “New Dark Age. Technology and the End of Future“. During the lockdown nearly everything that was left for the art world to connect, share and experience were digital devices and new technologies. The digital boom was hit by a wave of criticism of technology. Artists have always worked with new technologies, and at the same time critically question them.

Experiencing a global lockdown is an excuse for utopian escapism into a game environment as the only place left to experience and interact with art. The British artist Thomas @Webb built a virtual world for new media artists to share their thoughts on what technology is and could be.

The WORLD WIDE WEBB is a virtual world the digital visitor enters through the browser on a smartphone. It is a multiplayer video game, a digital exhibition space and a world full of art and characters the visitor is invited to interact with. Webb recreates the social spontaneity of the world pre-Covid-19. Net art is presented in its genuine medium, the digital realm, where video art is also easily accessible. The visitor meets AI avatars designed by Webb, to reflect the human nature and to question the use of technology in the digital age.

Artists: Koo Jeong A, Aram Bartholl, Alice Bucknell, Arvida Byström, Stine Deja, Keiken, Kesh, Jonas Lund, Rachel Maclean, Tabor Robak, Manuel Rossner, Nicole Ruggiero, Sebastian Schmieg, Thomas Webb

Concept: Anika Meier & Thomas Webb

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