January 28, 2009 - February 1, 2009

transmediale's 2009 award exhibition presents a spectrum of artistic positions, inquiries and responses to the multifacetted, and often contradictory scenarios of climate change. Will the melting of the polar ice-caps lead to an emergency situation in which survival is paramount? Beyond the spectre of a world knocked out of climatic control by our collective lack of foresight, the exhibition explores the symptoms, contexts and possible futures of a seemingly imperceptible yet fundamental change. Alluding to the interconnectedness and global reach of actions triggered at the polar ice cap... from the breaking open of new territories for geopolitical competition to the opacity of Congo's hidden mines through to the disintegration´of Antarctica's 'share alike' treaty, the exhibition seeks to uncover strategies that counter our mundane sense of powerlessness in the face of overwhelming change, and through vision and critique aim at a new cultural rethink.

Survival and Utopia: Visions of Balance in Transformation' explores these notions with a series of interdisciplinary art works that reflect on our digital culture and technological
condition. Within the specially-commissioned festival architecture by Berlin based art and architecture collective raumtaktik, the exhibition becomes part of DEEP NORTH's scenario of fleeting temporality, urgency and strategic sustainability. Encompassing the House of World Cultures as its base, the exhibition extends with an installation of serial software art at [DAM]Berlin and a major site specific generative installation at the Collegium Hungaricum Berlin.