Associated Events Find out more of communication and exchange that surround us. We see architecture as the Easter Holidays Model Making Workshops Visit the Resource Room where you can find most tangible and enduring record of the Tuesday 10 April, 2–4pm a selection of books, audio and film. way we live. The internet giants continue Wednesday 11 April, 2–4pm to grow exponentially, becoming ever £4 per child If you have any questions about the Exhibition Guide more powerful by the day, and exercising Glenn Howells Architects, Bradford Street exhibition please ask the Information an increasingly profound influence over Birmingham B5 6ET Assistants in the gallery. our lives. They are reshaping the cultures, Booking essential, places are limited Langlands & Bell politics and economies of societies all Families are invited to design and construct How to book Internet Giants : Masters of the Universe over the world comprehensively. their own architectural model with Pierre Book online at ikon-gallery.org or call us on 21 March – 10 June 2018 Greenway, designer and maker at Glenn 0121 248 0708. All events take place at Ikon First Floor Galleries At first glance the futuristic appearances Howells Architects. This workshop is suitable Gallery unless otherwise stated. of the new headquarters of the media for children aged over 7, accompanied by As with the cathedrals of the middle companies characterise the digital age: an adult. When booking please indicate ages, the baroque palaces and gardens flagships for voyages of discovery in virtual children’s ages. Stay in touch of the enlightenment, and the factories worlds, whose campuses, seamlessly glennhowells.co.uk and railway stations of the industrial translated from computer screens, convey Subscribe to our e-bulletin at revolution, one of the things we are a complexity of attitudes and values in Repeated Cities ikon-gallery.org and find us on exploring is whether the new architecture keeping with a brave new world. A series Wednesday 18 April, 1.30–4pm – £6 ikongallery of the internet giants is era defining – the of eight relief sculptures, encased in square Booking essential, places are limited architecture of the 21st century. frames with circular mounts, offer a uniform A tour of Ikon’s Langlands & Bell exhibition Ikon Gallery presentation of monumental architecture. followed by a guided walk led by Alessandro Brindleyplace, Birmingham b1 2hs Ikon presents an exhibition of new work The fact that these companies deal in Columbano, Senior Lecturer at Birmingham 0121 248 0708 by British artists Ben Langlands and intangible commodities means that they do School of Architecture and Design, exploring ikon-gallery.org Nikki Bell, marking the 40th year of their not require functionalist design solutions, the architectural landscape of Birmingham. artistic partnership. Featuring new, iconic but rather are asserting themselves through Join us for refreshments and conversation Open Tuesday – Sunday architecture of global technology companies symbolic forms. afterwards in a local public house. Please and Bank Holiday Mondays, 11am–5pm such as Apple, Facebook, Alibaba and Google, wear footwear appropriate to urban walking. Free entry, donations welcome it includes a series of relief sculptures, We’re isolating the subject like a installations, computer imagery and portraits specimen in a museum, like a butterfly Langlands & Bell Round Table Exhibition supporters that explore the increasingly profound or moth, against different colours, to Tuesday 5 June, 6–8pm Langland & Bell’s exhibition Internet Giants : influence these companies have on our lives focus on it. We exclude other elements, Event ticket only – £3 Masters of the Universe is supported by in the age of ‘Big Data’. such as the landscape or a parking lot for Event ticket plus signed Langlands & Bell Glenn Howells Architects. example. The aesthetics of the source catalogue – £13 (for collection on 5 June) Often, Langlands & Bell work from plans and material, as well as the subject matter, Booking essential Ikon’s Learning Programme is supported by other drawings they find through internet inspires us to turn it into an object of Chaired by Niall Hobhouse, collector, Arts Connect West Midlands, Birmingham research, sometimes representing buildings contemplation. It is an intuitive process. architectural writer and founder of Drawing City University, Cass Art and the Michael yet to be completed. Using both digital and Matter Trust, this event includes a round Marsh Charitable Trust. analogue processes, they create physical A digital print of Apple Park - which replaced table discussion with Langlands & Bell models, reminiscent of those traditionally the company’s original campus in 2017 - on notions of ‘campus’, where people found in an architect’s office. These include presents the iconic ring-shaped building meet and share ideas, adopted by global Google, Charleston East (2018), offering a in angled sections. This exhibition includes technology companies. Other speakers plan view of Google’s new global HQ, and a digital animation of the “Masters of the include Claudia Dutson, PhD, lecturer on the Facebook, Menlo Park (2017), the largest open- Universe” and a new wall painting, Your Information Experience Design MA, School plan office in the world where the staff use Thoughts Construct Patterns Like Scaffolding of Architecture, Royal College of Art, London. micro scooters to travel around the campus. In Your Mind (2018), based on a quote by These are built environments, above all, that Steve Jobs, the late co-founder of Apple, and mean something, and are thus ideal subject produced in collaboration with Birmingham- matter for the artists, as they explain: based street artist Dan “Newso” Lickiss. A series of pixelated “mosaic” icons of Steve Nearly all of our art explores human Jobs, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, social and cultural relationships, from Sergey Brin and Jimmy Wales, combined in Printed on recycled paper. the personal to the political, through diptychs with their inspirational utterances, Ikon Gallery Limited trading as Ikon. Registered charity no. 528892. architecture and the coded structures “I want to put a ding in the universe” and “I’m trying to make the world a more open Julian Assange – WikiLeaks First Floor Clément Cogitore place”, appear as religious icons for the TRUE INFORMATION DOES GOOD Galleries Assange Dancing information age. 21 March – 10 June Larry Page – Google 14 Tower Room – Second Floor The digital animation, Pantocrater (2018) THERE IS AN IMPORTANT ARTISTIC Entrance – derived from the Greek “ruler of all” – COMPONENT IN WHAT WE DO 15 Ikon presents Assange Dancing (2012) by 13 comprises 26 portraits of and quotes by the 19 16 French filmmaker, photographer and artist tech company CEOs, including: Lei Jun – Xiaomi Inc. Clément Cogitore. THINGS GET MUCH EASIER IF ONE JUMPS 12 18 17 Alex Karp – Palantir Technologies ON THE BANDWAGON 7 Screened in Ikon’s Tower Room, Assange I’M LOSING MY ABILITY TO BE COMPLETELY Dancing was made using amateur video ANONYMOUS Luke Nosek – PayPal 6 8 footage, shot and posted online by a DJ at TECHNOLOGY IS A WAY TO HELP Reykjavik nightclub Glaumbar in 2011. In it Ben Silbermann – Pinterest EVERYBODY ON THE PLANET we see activist and WikiLeaks founder Julian DON’T TAKE TOO MUCH ADVICE 5 9 Assange dancing in utter solitude on a nearly Marissa Mayer – Google ,Yahoo deserted dancefloor. Yet by the force of his Bill Gates – Microsoft YOU HAVE TO MAKE WORDS LESS HUMAN network, he represents a crowd in and of I DON’T THINK CULTURE IS SOMETHING AND MORE A PIECE OF THE MACHINE 4 3 11 10 himself. By revisiting the image in a slow- YOU CAN DESCRIBE motion loop, Cogitore endows the dance Mark Zuckerberg – Facebook with the quality of a ritual trance for casting Brian Chesky – AirBnB I’M TRYING TO MAKE THE WORLD A MORE out demons. BUILD SOMETHING ONE HUNDRED OPEN PLACE PEOPLE LOVE, NOT SOMETHING ONE 2 Clément Cogitore studied in Strasbourg, MILLION PEOPLE KIND OF LIKE Mike Krieger – Instagram France, where he developed an artistic JUST BECAUSE YOU’VE GOOGLED practice half way between cinema and Dick Costolo – Twitter SOMETHING DOESN’T MEAN YOU’VE contemporary art, combining film, video, TWITTER IS A GLOBAL TOWN SQUARE LEARNED 1 installations and photographs. His award- Entrance winning films have been shown at a number Drew Houston – Dropbox Peter Thiel – PayPal of international festivals, including Cannes, YOU ONLY HAVE TO BE RIGHT ONCE THE FUTURE IS LIMITLESS Locarno, Lisbon and Montreal. His work has also been exhibited in museums around the Elon Musk – Space Ex, Tesla Pierre Omidyar – eBay world, including Palais de Tokyo Paris, Centre YOU NEED TO EMBRACE CHANGE IF THE WHATEVER FUTURE YOU’RE BUILDING, Georges Pompidou Paris, Haus der Kulturen ALTERNATIVE IS DISASTER DON’T TRY TO PROGRAM EVERYTHING der Welt, Berlin, Museum of Fine Arts, 1. Icon (Sergey Brin), 2018 Boston, Quebec Museum of Fine Arts and Jack Dorsey – Twitter Sergey Brin – Google 2. Google, Charleston East, 2018 MoMA, New York. EXPECT THE UNEXPECTED AND WE WANT GOOGLE TO BE THE THIRD HALF 3. Suning.com, Nanjing, 2018 WHENEVER POSSIBLE BE THE UNEXPECTED OF YOUR BRAIN 4. Baidu, Beijing, 2018 In 2015, Clément Cogitore’s debut feature 5. IBM, Beijing, 2018 film,Neither Heaven Nor Earth, a supernatural Jack Ma – Alibaba Sheryl Sandberg – Facebook 6. Alibaba, Hangzhou, 2018 thriller set during the war in Afghanistan, I DON’T WANT TO BE LIKED I WANT TO BE WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF YOU WEREN’T 7. Facebook, Menlo Park, 2017 premiered in Cannes Critics’ Week where it RESPECTED AFRAID 8. Apple, Cupertino, 2018 received the Foundation Gan Prize. 9. Gates Family Foundation, Seattle, 2018 Jeff Bezos – Amazon Steve Jobs – Apple 10. Apple, Sunny Vale, 2017 Presented as part of Birmingham IT’S NOT AN EXPERIMENT IF YOU KNOW I WANT TO PUT A DING IN THE UNIVERSE 11. Nvidia, Santa Clara, 2018 International Dance Festival 2018 IT’S GOING TO WORK 12. Icon (Steve Jobs), 2018 Travis Kalanick – Uber 13. Your Thoughts Construct Patterns Like Please note the Tower Room is only Jensen Huang – Nvidia YOU CAN BEND REALITY BUT YOU Scaffolding In Your Mind, 2018 accessible via a number of steps. THE DISPLAY IS THE COMPUTER CANNOT BREAK IT 14. Pantocrator, 2018 (3’25”) 15. Icon (Jeff Bezos), 2018 Jimmy Wales – Wikipedia Vitalik Buterin – Ethereum, Bitcoin 16. Icon (Bill Gates), 2018 I THINK THAT REALITY EXISTS AND THAT I REMEMBER KNOWING FOR A LONG TIME 17. Icon (Mark Zuckerberg), 2018 IT’S KNOWABLE THAT I WAS KIND OF ABNORMAL 18. Icon (Jimmy Wales), 2018 19. Infinite Loop (Apple, Cupertino), 2018