Next-Age
Gathered under the term “New Age,” the Western neo-religious movements of the late 20th century advocated personal development as a means to achieve a new age of collective consciousness and happiness. In their disillusioned wake, boosted by digital capitalism, new forms of spirituality fueled by misinformation (conspiracy theories, alternative facts, fake news, deep fakes) and the polarization of opinions generated by content personalization (artificial intelligence and data processing) have emerged since the 2000s under the terminology “Next Age.” These new spiritualities appropriate various Eastern philosophies (tantra, yoga), certain alternative medicines, astrology, esotericism, and occultism, as well as psychotherapy and neurolinguistics, picking and choosing a curious mix of beliefs and sciences to serve a discourse primarily focused on the physical, spiritual, and often financial development of the individual. Informal and multifaceted, these discourses shift the quest for transformation from a collective scale to an individual one.
Through an ephemeral device materializing the networks that carry their messages and the nodes that allow them to emerge, Charles-Arthur Feuvrier transforms the new guru-entrepreneurs into tentacled monsters. Their mixed echoes preach methodical recipes for spiritual awakening and access to happiness, resembling a managerial plan set against sunset backgrounds. Deployed in a semicircle, these dehumanized discourses, embodied by artificial mouths, invade the exhibition space around a central point occupied by the spectator, who is unwittingly forced into a position of disciple. Between awakening and conditioning, the sometimes contradictory affirmations staged here reflect a transformation that began in the early 20th century, shifting from a need-based economy to a desire-based economy centered on the individual, where digital capitalism and its new spiritualities take root. (...)
- Antoine Champenois
Exerpt from the exhibition text written for Next-Age at Ateliers Vortex, Dijon, (Fr) in 2024.
Exerpt from the exhibition text written for Next-Age at Ateliers Vortex, Dijon, (Fr) in 2024.
Next-Age, Masking tape, kraft paper, screens, video loop 5:00, LEDs, PC fans. Les Ateliers Vortex, Dijon France, 2024. Photo credit, Pauline Rosen-Cros.
