JANEK SIMON
SYNTHETIC FOLKLORE

Edited by Joanna Warsza
Published by Sternberg Press
English
236 pages
16 x 23 cm
ISBN 978-3-95679-510-7

Price: 128 lei


With contributions by INKE ARNS, MAX CEGIELSKI, EKATERINA DEGOT, ŁUKASZ GORCZYCA, NAV HAQ, VIRGINIJA JANUŠKEVIČIŪTĖ, NINA KATCHADOURIAN, JOANNA KORDJAK, PABLO LARIOS, MAŁGORZATA LUDWISIAK, LEV MANOVICH, DANIEL MUZYCZUK, SINA NAJAFI, LECH NOWICKI, ANA TEIXEIRA PINTO, AGNIESZKA POLSKA, ALEKSANDRA PRZEGALIŃSKA, MOHAMMAD SALEMY, SUMESH SHARMA, JANEK SIMON, JAN SOWA, JOANNA WARSZA less

Janek Simon is not only an artist and occasional curator, he is also an anarchist, programmer, craftsman, intellectual, social organizer, traveler, and former junior champion of the card game bridge. He likes to say that he is interested in too many things, from globalization, political geography, artificial intelligence, digital materialism, algorithmic governance, financial speculation, and DIY strategies, to postcolonial theories within eastern Europe and Gombrowicz-like dilemmas on what Polish identity actually is. Simon’s work captivates both visually and intellectually and is driven by constant curiosity, erudition, and the quest for what he calls “synthetic folklore”—the question of how to cherish what is particular while constructing a planetary value system with the use of new technologies. This book, on the last fifteen years of his work, is published in conjunction with Simon’s eponymous exhibition, curated by Joanna Warsza, at Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art, Warsaw, in 2019.