Currently on view at KW Institute for Contemporary Art in Berlin, Kate Cooper’s “Rigged” series features some of the glossiest, most fully-fleshed, corporate-budget-level CGI renders we’ve seen this year. They are immaculate, down to their wet gums, pores and eyelashes.
According to DIS, the body of work “looks at the agency of the computer generated female within the glossy aesthetics of consumer capitalism.” The show, comprised of giant, light-boxed stills and soft video portraits, features HD models jogging, showing off their braces, and performing other advertising-friendly actions.
In all images, particularly of women, there’s a relationship to desire, and within that a real violence; especially within these CG images. Still, I feel like there must be a way to negotiate these worlds, explore their potential, and make them one’s own. It’s not about reclaiming the world or aesthetics of hypercapitalism, but about occupying or invading it. I find that an interesting proposition to myself as an artist. Maybe there’s a freedom in the things that are supposed to restrict us.
