Part of The Zapatista Wi-Fi Rebellion program, Glitching the System is an exhibition organized by gloria galvez, inspired not only by the rebellious digital presence of Zapatistas on the internet, but also by the act of glitching in which one finds and exploits glitches, errors, mistakes, or bugs in a digital system to achieve something that was not intended by the designers. Both of these phenomena hold massive possibilities to inspire and catalyze broad-based resistance, the Zapatistas’ internet presence by setting the digital political precedent and glitching by providing the means.

Exhibition Open Hours
September 20 from 7-10PM
(concurrent with the screening of The Sixth Sun: Uprising in the Chiapas)

September 22 from 4:30-9PM
(concurrent with Lectures by Fran Ilich and Daniela Lieja Quintanar)

September 23 from 12-8PM
Open gallery hours

The Zapatista Wi-Fi Rebellion is the third installment in NAVEL’s ongoing series The New Internet Commons.

Exhibition Information

Glitching the System includes works by artists Anxious to Make, Taniel Morales, Taeyoon Choi, Fran Ilich, Aboriginal Territories in Cyberspace.

WWWORK by Anxious to Make, which is comprised of collaborative duo Liat Berdugo and Emily Martinez, transforms internet sourced images, sounds and films originally intended for capitalist and spectaclist purposes into a revelatory video essay utilizing the remixed critical texts of contemporary thinkers to expose the commodification of labor and arts within the globally networked society. The work bursts the internet consumerist bubble and sets the foundation to a dissatisfaction needed for rebellion. Clandestino is an audio bit of Radio Pirata (pirate radio), which is now a digital web based archive of audio collages smashing provocative thoughts and sounds to create auditory space for political and social reflections. This sound experience is coupled with *Trabajo (work) which is a pull tab poster destined to transform, as the tabs are pulled off, both itself and the USA subjugated geolocation of Latin America. Both pieces flesh out a visual and auditory interruption to the assumed naturalness of the status quo.

Taeyoon Choi’s Distributed Web of Care platforms the webs of care that enmesh him with digital and i.r.l peers doing the pedagogical work of retraining coders to code with care and carefully to perpetuate an internet realm that acknowledges that users are people who are to be nurtured and uplifted rather then controlled and targeted. The project of Fran Illich is the online community bank Space Bank that not only glitches the digital system of the internet, but furthermore also subverts the economic system’s capitalist and corporate leanings via the creation of wealth for underserved communities. AbTeC Island is an autonomous native land in the web based world of Second Life, the territory which was established and is tended by the indegenous artists collective Aboriginal Territories in Cyberspace, bringing a critical decolonial presence to a digital frontier toward where the future is headed.

Accompanying the exhibit a web based reading QR code library which has been curated by gloria galvez to enrich the context of the exhibition and educate folks on the rebellious digital presence of Zapatistas. Look also for a Zapatista email list sign-up station to stay connected to the movement.

Artist Biographies

Aboriginal Territories in Cyberspace is an Aboriginally determined research-creation network whose goal is to ensure Indigenous presence in the web pages, online environments, video games, and virtual worlds that comprise cyberspace. Co-founded and co-directed by Jason Edward Lewis and Skawennati, our multi-faceted effort includes artwork, writing, lectures, workshops, residencies, and exhibitions. AbTeC’s roots lie with a project called CyberPowWow, a pioneering on-line gallery and chat space for contemporary Indigenous art. http://abtec.org

Fran Ilich is an artist and writer based in New York City who works in the theory and practice of narrative media, experimental economies and finance, and hacktivism. He is the author of several award-winning novels, a monograph on narrative and ideology, and numerous works of narrative media that range from interactive web telenovelas, experimental theater, alternate reality games, and utopian experiments in social organization that link agriculture and art. In his recent project, Aridoamérica Winter Plan, he turned a storefront space in Williamsburg into a neighborhood coffee co-op with its own micro-economy, for a solo exhibition funded by ISCP at El Museo de Los Sures. He was a fellow at Eyebeam and A Blade of Grass. He has produced work for exhibitions or projects of the New School’s Vera List Center for Art and Politics, No Longer Empty and others. He was Visiting Lecturer at the Literature Department of the University of California San Diego and director of the Literature Department at Centro Cultural Tijuana. He participated in Berlinale Talent Campus, Transmediale, ARCO, Documenta, EZLN’s Festival Mundial de la Digna Rabia, Other Futures (Amsterdam), Antidoto (Sao Paulo), The Economist Summit Mexico. Has shown work at the Walker Art Center, Creative Time Living as Form, IAGO (Oaxaca), and others. franilich.com

Taeyoon Choi is an artist, writer and computer programmer. He makes paintings, performances and installations that intersect his research and practice. He collaborates with various local communities, collectives and small institutions. Recently, he’s thinking about the relationships between personhood, technology, environment, gender, race, and disability. He’s a co-founder of the School for Poetic Computation, where he continues to teach and organize research projects. He was a fellow at the Eyebeam Art and Technology Center, Data and Society Research Institute. His projects were presented at the LACMA, The Whitney Museum of American Art, The New Museum, Mediacity Seoul Biennale, Shanghai Biennale, Istanbul Design Biennale and more. Taeyoon is an immigrant from South Korea, based in Lenapehoking, otherwise known as New York City. http://taeyoonchoi.com/

Taniel Morales is a sound artist and musician who received a BFA from Escuela Nacional de Artes Plásticas (ENAP) in 1996. As a musician for more than thirty years, he has created sound art, directed plays, hosted radio programs, and played with groups of different genres, including Los Rastrillos, The Quintet Quartet Trio, Tres Tristes Tigres, Fela, Vuélvete Underground, La MechA, Las Adelas, and Plastipuchas y su Bello Público, appearing in various forums, plazas, stadiums, cafes, theaters, and auditoriums throughout Mexico and abroad. Morales was a member of Acción Virus, a collective of young graduates from art, film and philosophy colleges (Escuela Nacional de Artes Plásticas, UNAM, San Carlos, “La Esmeralda”, CCC Centro de Capacitación Cinematográfica, CUEC Centro Universitario de Estudios Cinematográficos) that met weekly to do actions of citizenship consciousness. They did performances, installations, events, exhibitions, etc. Acción Virus started to collaborate with pirate radio stations Radio pirata, televerdad, La voladora, El H Ruido, Radio Zapote, radio Trucha, XCH sin permiso. Recent sound-based actions, installations, exhibitions and performances include Acciones sonoras, Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City (2015); Péndulo histórico, Casa Talavera Cultural Center, Mexico City (2014); Tranza-acción, Museo Universitario del Chopo, Mexico City (2013); Anónimo, Galería del Faro de Oriente, Mexico City (2012); Parcial o total, Museo de Universitario Arte Contemporáneo, Mexico City (2010); Re-Insert-Sound System, Cité Internationale des Artes, Paris (2009); Celular, Celda Contemporáneo, Mexico City (2007); and 41,472, Casa de América, Madrid (2006). http://www.tanielmorales.com

Anxious to Make is the collaborative practice of Liat Berdugo and Emily Martinez, two commissioning bodies. Their focus is on economic concepts, such as cryptocurrencies and the so-called “sharing economy,” and the accelerationist, neoliberal landscapes associated with them. Their work examines how these economic concepts intersect with colonialism, technology, wealth culture, race, altruism, utopianism, and exploitation. http://anxioustomake.ga/

gloria galvez is Los Angeles based and maintains a life practice that disrupts, subverts, and dismantles bland and oppressive status-quo norms. She is committed to creating access to physical and abstract spaces of possibility, imagination and self-determination for communities and individuals for whom it’s constantly denied. https://gloria-galvez.com/