until 24 Nov ’24 – The Engineer’s Bedroom

This is a resting place, a warehouse and a mirror of the mind rolled into one. The engineer who maintains Disco Inferno spends his days and nights here. He sits in his armchair, staring into space, obsessively working on ideas at his drawing board and never venturing outside. Only work counts for the engineer, he is completely emotionally and physically neglected. Even in bed, he is surrounded by a multitude of monitors showing non-stop video of machines destroying discarded consumer goods, for the spectacle and pleasure of the destruction itself or as an intermediate step in their reuse.

The Engineer’s Bedroom is where instincts, urges and the darkest fears live. The obsession with constantly wanting to create is overpoweringly present. The tools of choice are industrial lathes, milling machines and all kinds of cheap, Chinese-made equipment, destined to fail, but dominating the global market anyway due to price. That very same China has raised an army that marches across Tiananmen Square like a well-oiled machine. The soldiers march in perfect synch, dressed in custom uniforms, emotionless and ready to overrun the globe in a disciplined manner. Footage of Chinese military omnipotence is shown alongside that of primitive manufacturing processes in the Pakistani countryside – a form of inefficient and dangerous cottage industry that is intended to make people self-reliant.

BRUTUS >