| WORK BIOGRAPHY | The white lab rat, threatened by a weapon that could be triggered via the internet, was to live in Florian Mehnert‘s art installation for eleven days. The internet world followed the livestream in an uproar. A worldwide shitstorm and numerous death threats followed. The art experiment `11 DAYS ́ went around the world. How did the interactive art experiment work? Why was the experiment ended on the seventh day instead of the eleventh? Was the audience itself the lab rat in the end? Florian Mehnert publishes for the first time what really happened.
`11 DAYS´ gives a frightening insight into a society controlled by aggression and hatred.
Available in bookstores.
ISBN: 9783750494503 more about the project 11 DAYS
Social Distance Stacks deals with the omnipresent situation of social distance in the Corona Pandemic.The project makes the social distance in the exceptional situation of the Corona Pandemic visible, and creates a platform for discussion and discourse. # more about Social Distance Stacks
January 2021
ACCIDENT WORLD
Accident World is an artistic social experiment that explores the psychology of voyeurism and the human fascination with destructive scenarios.
The project asks about the ethical implications of ki-generated images and reflects on a debate about the consequences of fake realities and the possible effects on individual and ultimately on social perception.
It raises questions about human behavior and emotional responses. By presenting a vast series of AI-generated photographs depicting fictional accidents and chaotic situations, the project aims to evoke different reactions in the viewer.
Do fictional images that seem real have the potential to put the viewer in a state of suspense?
Accident World stimulates a reflection on the nature of reality and the limits of our perception.
Ultimately, Accident World calls for a critical examination of the source of the image.
SMARTPHONE STACKS is an artistic photo project. Florian Mehnert has stacked and photographed young people with their smartphones. (see also photo project REFUGEE STACK, 2016)
Behind the art project SMARTPHONE STACKS are important current questions:
Today, the smartphone is the main means of communication of the "digital natives". Much of the exchange takes place via WhatsApp, Snapchat and Instagram.
In what ways are smartphones changing not only the way we communicate, but also the quality of our communication?
Are Whatsapp and Instagram replacing differentiated discourse and personal conversation?
90% of over 959,000 apps in Google's Play Store track user behavior and deliver the data to a third-party network.
We live in the age of "surveillance capitalism" and the "privacy paradox".
Although we are aware of the destruction of our privacy and dignity, we agree to the collection of our behavioural data.
The SMARTPHONE STACKS visualize how the human being is reduced to a data raw material to be calculated.
They create a visual access to reflect on the role of the smartphone and our privacy.
Virtual, networked, analog. Expert Day on Arts, Cultural and Political Education in the Digital Change
On June 20, 2019, around 80 experts met at the Genshagen Foundation to discuss the effects of digital change in art, culture and society.
Florian Mehnert spoke here about "Dataism versus freedom 2.0".
Positions from the contemporary arts, cultural education and educational research were presented and brought into dialogue with political education. Spaces for design that make new experiences possible through the arts and education were explored, the fusion of the digital and analog worlds into new hybrid forms was identified, digital maturity was controversially discussed, and phenomena associated with digitization, such as the need to reorganize hierarchies, were discussed.
October 2018, Art & Algorithms, NRW FORUM Düsseldorf
The series of events presents and discusses one artistic work on the topic of Big Data on each of three evenings at the NRW-Forum Düsseldorf. The first event on October 12, 2018 was hosted by the artist Florian Mehnert, who has repeatedly addressed the visualization and criticism of Big Data phenomena in his artistic work in recent years. The event was moderated by Dr. Harald Gapski (Grimme Institute).
The event series Art & Algorithms was organized by Prof. Manuel Zahn (University of Cologne) and Dr. Harald Gapski (Grimme Institute) in cooperation with the NRW-Forum, Düsseldorf. The series was sponsored by the Grimme Research College at the University of Cologne.
FREIHEIT 2.0, June 2018, Stuttgart Over a period of 4 weeks Florian Mehnert intervened in public space with his project FREIHEIT 2.0 Stuttgart. His data traces were virtual and analogous on the streets through the city center up to the newly opened Stadtpalais. For 4 weeks the interdisciplinary BIG DATA colloquia with speakers from the scientific community accompanied the project.
“The Beauty of Privacy” is a project that aesthetically processes and visualizes human motion profiles.
Motion profiles are one of the most coveted data in the BIG DATA industry. They are collected every day by means of Smartphone Apps, Fitnesstrackers and Automobiles.
The motion profiles of “The Beauty of Privacy” are from anonymous users of the app FREEDOM 2.0, which is part of art project of the Florian Mehnert with the same name.
“The Beauty of Privacy” shows the aesthetic side of the disputed personal data: the beauty of the abstraction that anonymous motion profiles develop without georeferenced reference in their artistic processing.
Florian Mehnert stacks African refugees.
The stacks are his artistic response to current events.
The REFUGEE STACK points out that behind every refugee is a personal story,
an individual fate, a person with abilities and dreams.
As a reaction to the NSA scandal, Florian Mehnert had installed microphones at clearings and paths in german forests over days in 2013. His installed microphones, were recording passing by walkers.
© Stiftung Genshagen
C/O Berlin, FOREST PROTOCOLS Installation © Foto: David von Becker