Hessel Museum of Art, New Yo

No one is bored 

December 1 – December 11, 2022

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Co-curators: Josefina Barcia, Sophie Rose, Lili-Rebecka Toth

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Artists: Tina Barney, Anne Collier, Moyra Davey, Kerry Downey, Liam Gillick, On Kawara, Bruce Nauman, Cameron Rowland, and Thomas Struth.

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In the essay “No one is bored; everything is boring,” cultural theorist Mark Fisher describes the ways that new technology has obliterated a boredom particular to the twentieth century, or what he calls Boredom 1.0: “the dreary void of Sundays, the night hours after television stopped broadcasting, even the endless dragging minutes waiting in queues.”

Drawing its title from Fisher’s text, the exhibition No one is bored asks how we might recover these small fissures of tedium in the seemingly never-ending cycle of work. Since the Industrial Revolution, time has functioned as a currency to be saved, carefully spent, and earned back through labor. As an intrusion into the productive day, boredom invites an excess of barren time. Given that each moment of our lives, at work or at home, is a chance to grind, hustle, improve, and produce, this exhibition asks: How does one become truly bored?

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