interMetro

By its very essence the Internet has a spatial spread. However, what we feel as we surf from site to site has nothing to do with the classical notion of space: time as well as what we call physical distance is no longer something infinite. Naturally this has nothing to do with the existence of real time, determined by movement or distance. The time in question no longer exists except as a function of a target point defined by its content.The goal here is not the site we access with a clicking movement, but the movement itself, the act. Working like this we can travel the world by subway through surfing the Internet. However, the aim here is not a comparison between the structure of the Internet, which is only a starting point for the task in hand, and a subway network; it is, rather, to establish the state and evolution of a fresh piece of data on which one is working in the Internet world. If a picture of a subway station really appears on the screen we will become witnesses to the totally novel uninterrupted spectacle of everyday life in different cities around the world.
　As a viewer discovers this spectacle of cities with cultures and histories that are so utterly different, the viewer will have the impression of being everywhere and nowhere at the same time. This experience shows the incredible richness and ephemerality of data on the internet, and the differences there can be between things considered a priori as similar. This is the necessary precondition for recognizing that in the world of the internet there are no hierarchies, and that each piece of data is of equal value. And so we follow the links, one after another, in our pursuit of a line as imaginary as that of the horizon.

Interactive video installation, 340 min