HomeCity NewsMONA Debuts New Exhibit ‘Brain Without Organs’

MONA Debuts New Exhibit ‘Brain Without Organs’

First published in the April 2 print issue of the Glendale News Press.

The Museum of Neon Art recently presented the world premiere of “The Brain Without Organs: The Aporia of Care,” an exhibit of two large neon installations and a series of blacklight-activated paintings by artist Warren Neidich.
The exhibit uses light and immersive installations to “consider philosophical and conceptual questions around information, capitalism and the evolution of the brain,” according to an announcement from the museum, located at 216 S. Brand Blvd. in Glendale.
“Warren Neidich’s works exist at the border zones of art, science and social justice,” the announcement said. “Over the past two decades, Neidich has applied neurological and aesthetic approaches to understanding humans’ evolving relationship with information technology. He has engaged these issues from the role of curator, writer and artist.”
In 1996, Neidich co-founded Artbrain.org and the Journal of Neuroaesthetics. Twenty-six years and many exhibits, symposia and anthologies later, Neidich’s works continue to question the “evolving networks of control, surveillance and information under capitalism and globalism, and how they are redefining and reshaping systems of the brain,” the museum’s statement added.
“Neon is a technology invented at the turn of the 20th century as a tool of commerce and advertising. The bright shine of electrified noble gas still connects on a deep level with viewers both as material of commerce as well as an aesthetic tool, capturing attention, as well as eliciting wonder,” MONA Executive Director Corrie Siegel said in a statement.
The title of the exhibit is inspired by a concept of “Body Without Organs,” which originated in the writings of Antonin Artaud and was expanded by philosophers Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari.
Neidich said his exhibit explores how the brain is “both located in the skull as well as an expansive socio-political entity, developing along with machine learning, big data and social media.”
Neidich lives and works in New York and Berlin. His performative and sculptural work, “Pizzagate Neon (2018),” was displayed at the Venice Biennial 2019. In 2015, he founded the Saas-Fee Summer Institute of Art, a nomadic, intensive summer academy with shifting programs in contemporary critical theory that stresses an interdisciplinary approach to understanding the relationship between art and politics.

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