Rut Karin Zettergren: Nightboon

It is with excitement that the Curatorial Program for Research invites you to this one-person exhibition with Swedish artist Rut Karin Zettergren that is her first time presenting work in the US. The VR-piece Nightboon is at the center of this installation presenting a sleep-disordered future where the hyperactive 24/7 society has gone a step further and only dream oracles can sleep. Their dreams are recorded and create Nightboons, surrealistic experiences that the technologically advanced consume to feel human. Zettergren also provides a feathered resting ground on the gallery floor as an invitation to visitors to explore this scenario for the “non-dreamers” through the imaginary treasures of dreams or to just rest if they are tired:

“Rest, you sleep drunk drowsy dream oracle, sink into the dream mystery of hibernation. Stagger sleepily through the dream world. Lazy, indolent, foggy, lingering in a dreamlike existence. A dreamy dream-doctrine for the sleepless dream-technology of the dream-sick. Snooze in the feather bed. Sleep in peace, dream up a dreamlike dream image in this hypnagogic dream play.”

For this occasion Zettergren has allowed for the nightboons, digital sculptures as escapees from the Virtual Reality, to enter CPR2 as large scale projections on the gallery walls and the glass front. They will be visible to awake Brooklyners who pass by at any hour of the night. 

The Nightboons are developed from a series of drawings that Rut Karin Zettergren made during a few weeks while recovering from a rare illness that made her sleep long hours. 

The dream journal that she kept at the time and the lush dreams promoted by her deep sleep was the base for Dreaming the technological, a wider scope of work that Nightboon is part of. It is the artist’s exploration of how technology affects sleep and dreams. 

Rut Karin Zettergrens work often begins as an investigation into historical events or speculations about the future. In recent years, she has been influenced by theories and histories around cyber, glitch and cyborg feminism, science fiction, technological heritage, and the construction of modernity. Her works take the form of drawings, performances, video, spatial installations, VR and online presentations. Rut Karin often works in groups and collaborations as she believes in polymorphous thinking and knowledge situated in between individuals. She has been part of artist groups such as 0s+1s Collectives that focused on techno feminism and investigated the military and patriarchal heritage of technology, Crystal Beacon that investigate futurities through art and Whyte&Zettergren who uses performance to search for methods to heal historical traumas caused by colonial transatlantic legacies.

Rut Karin Zettergren has presented works at institutions as Mänttä Festival, Sinne, Titanic gallery (Finland), Barbican Centre, FACT Centre, Arnolfini (UK) Oberhausen Int. Film Festival, Städtische Galerie Bremen, Laborneunzehn (Germany), Taiwan Int. Video Art Exhibition (Taiwan), Impakt Festival, Rotterdam Int. Film Festival (Netherlands), Havana Biennale (Cuba), West Space (Australia), Göteborgs Konsthall, Visby Konstmuseum, Södertälje Konsthall, Tensta Konsthall, Fotografiska Museet and Galleri 54 (Sweden).

The production of Nightboon and  the exhibition is made with support of the Swedish Arts Grants Committee. A special thanks for artistic and technical support to Delfina Foundation, Celsius Projects, Inter Arts Center and the Royal Institute of Art.

Opening event Nightboon: January 19 at 6–8pm. 

January 14 is the last day for the ongoing exhibition Dialogue of an Instrument/Dial to Open Call in Public Space with Windy Fur Rundgren.