The artist collective Francis Karat, self-proclaimed border crossers between art and algorithms, exposes the scratchy embrace of the past and technology. In their latest multimedia work, Grüße aus Karlsruhe, no effort is spared to dissect the construct of memory using the latest AI technology and packaging it into nice little bites for collective discourse. The work can be seen until mid-January at the Tourist Information Centre in the Schaufenster Karlsruhe, which, like the UNESCO City of Media Arts Karlsruhe, is celebrating its fifth anniversary this year.
In focus: the Karlsruhe Municipal Archive, where long-forgotten architectural dreams and moments in time are waiting to be revived – with the friendly support of image-to-video AI tools. In addition, postcards from the past, those whispering artefacts that still know what it feels like to be smeared by human hands. Now, under the digital magnifying glass, they reinvent themselves: moving, transformed, strange and yet familiar. The whole spectacle wafts in a soundscape that oscillates between classical music and robot podcasts – perfect for losing yourself in the dense fog of nostalgia before being caught up in the cold pixels of the present.
Grüße aus Karlsruhe is based on the work Grüße aus’m SchwarzwAId, which was shown for the first time at art Karlsruhe 2024. In the Grüße aus… series, postcards and algorithms meet like two strangers in a dark alley. And the result? A strange mixture of a past that doesn’t want to go and a future that has long since overtaken us.
