Pakui Hardware at Bielefelder Kunstverein / Bielefeld

Pakui Hardware / Extrakorporal curated by Thomas Thiel 

November 17th 2018 – February 24th 2019

Bielefelder Kunstverein
Welle 61
33602 Bielefeld
Germany


























1 – 9 and 12 – 23 images by Ugnius Gelguda / all images copyright and courtesy of the
artist and Bielefelder Kunstverein

10 – 11 images by Philipp Ottendörfer / all images copyright and courtesy of the artist
and Bielefelder Kunstverein


Pakui Hardware is interested in the close relationship between materiality, technology
and economies. Central to their work is the question as to how far technology actually
does alter economics and our physical perception of reality. They investigate questions of
automation, robotics, synthetic biology and the significance of new materials. The artist
duo produces sculptures and installations suffused with various materials, images, and
shapes, which are often reminiscent of futuristic or biological settings. Here, fabric and
material produced by technology encounter transparent, ephemeral materials; they
determine the equally organic and synthetic appearance of their objects and spatial
installations.

The exhibition »Extrakorporal« immerses the viewer in a Petri dish, or perhaps in a
shamanistic realm? Here, organs and tissues grow outside bodies, the future behavior of
which is still a matter for speculation. Turritopsis jellyfish and sea-urchin larvae alike are
examined cell by cell in an attempt to track down the recipe that makes them immortal.
Seemingly familiar yet elusive objects are suspended in space and appear to evoke the
inexplicable energies of self-rejuvenation, and they are reminiscent of ritualistic masks.
They resemble trophies gained by extracting the essence of the life and, hence, of the
immortality these sea creatures possess.

Pakui Hardware, founded 2014 by Neringa Černiauskaitė, born in Klaipeda, Lithuania,
and Ugnius Gelguda, born in Vilnius, Lithuania. The artists are based in Berlin and
Vilnius. They had numerous solo shows since 2014, amongst others at EXILE in Vienna
(AUT), at Tenderpixel Gallery in London (GB, both 2018), at Trafó contemporary art
center in Budapest (HU), at SIC Room at Kiasma in Helsinki (FIN, both 2017), MUMOK
in Vienna (AUT, 2016) and at kim? Contemporary Art Center in Riga (LVA, 2015).
Lately they took part in group exhibitions, e.g. at MAXXI in Rome (I), at Domaine
Pommery in Reims (F), at Baltic Triennal 13 at Contemporary Art Center in Vilnius (LT),
at Museum Sztuki in Łódź (P, all 2018), at Kunstverein Braunschweig and Kunstverein
Freiburg, at the Kunsthalle Basel (SUI) and at Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts

(AUS, all 2017).