How ephemeral is data?
In the Schaufler Lab@TU Dresden, sculptor and conceptual artist Lena von Goedeke has, since May 2024, been researching the dimensions of Data↔Worlds in the context of the ongoing transformation of the Arctic. Her exhibition GROUND TRUTH, on view in the Gallery of the Kustodie (Office for Academic Heritage, Scientific and Art Collections) in the Görges-Bau, provides an initial insight into the themes and questions that have occupied the artist during her residency at the TUD Dresden University of Technology. The focus of her artistic exploration of the Arctic is the process-oriented investigation of material data storage, including its fragility and volatility.
Our image of the highly complex Arctic habitat is primarily characterized by a digital, dualistic (positive/negative) view: Drone and sensor images, microscopic visualizations, etc. almost inevitably lead to a simplistic, narrow perspective, which applies equally to synthesized visual equivalents. In her poetic yet analytical sculptures, installations, films and photographic works, Lena von Goedeke focuses on this discrepancy as she renders the physical, material and haptic dimensions and visual power of the Arctic region vivid and, above all, directly tangible.
For the exhibition, the artist collaborated with experts from the Department of Geosciences and worked with teaching and research objects from the university's Geological Collections and the paleobotany section in the Museum of Mineralogy and Geology of the Senckenberg Natural History Collections in Dresden.
 
We warmly invite you to the opening of the exhibition GROUND TRUTH by Lena von Goedeke on Friday, September 27, 2024, at 7:30 p.m., in the Gallery of the Kustodie in the Görges-Bau, Helmholtzstraße 9, 01069 Dresden.
 
The opening is part of the international annual conference Shaping Transformation. University Collections in a Changing World of ICOM-UMAC (International Committee for University Museums and Collections of the International Council of Museums) and the UNIVERSEUM European Academic Heritage Network, which is organized by the Kustodie.
In this context, we would also like to draw your attention to Lena von Goedeke’s participation in the conference: One day before the opening of her exhibition, on Thursday, September 26, she will take part in a roundtable on the topic "Collaborative Practices: Cross-encounters Between Art and Science in University Collections" in the Lichthof of the Albertinum, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden (Dresden State Art Collections).
 
We look forward to seeing you there!
Kind regards from the Schaufler Lab@TU Dresden -
Kirsten Vincenz, Moritz Ingwersen, Orit Halpern & Team