Mamali Shafahi
Mamali Shafahi (he/him) is a film-maker and video installation artist. He is fascinated by the impact of emerging technologies on life and art. His early work in France, at the Paris-Cergy school of fine arts, focused on performance. He then produced a number of video installations, and his investigation of relationships between the past, present, future and emerging technologies led to the V[i]Rology installation at the Mohsen Gallery, in 2017. From 2014 to 2017 he worked on his experimental docu-fiction film Nature Morte, involving his parents as both actors and digital characters. In 2019 he made an installation combining his father’s drawings with his own installation, sculptures and the film for City Princes/ses at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris. His VR projects, with Ali Eslami, have featured at Het Nieuwe Instituut and IDFA film festival among others. His nerd_funk VR project won the ‘Gouden Kalf’ for best interactive work at the 2020 Netherlands Film Festival.
Since we first caught sight of our reflections in still, dark waters, we started chasing self-image – driving us to refine the technologies we use to do so. At each step of this evolution, from silver-nitrate mirrors; to explosive flash powders and today’s one-eyed “selfie” cameras, new fables have emerged. These tales speak to the fragility of humanity and the fluidity of its values – each new reflecting pool becoming a site to question and play, or a means to entertain and bully guests at festivities. Mirrors – from those inhabiting the luxury salon to those in our linted pockets, each carry their own functions and emerging fairytales.
As new technologies create new opportunities to distort, beautify or otherwise adjust ourselves, in pursuit of self-knowledge, we become the protagonist of our own fantasies. Face filters engage us in a new daily ritual: the timeless ritual of masking – until today, these rituals take place in front of our phones. Through the screen of our phones we challenge binary structures and experience the prism of the self – while we train exploitative algorithms for ambitious startups, the development of neural networks and Artificial Intelligence. With every technological development, a slice of fiction becomes a reality. These fictions are a state of identity that emerges temporarily as we pursue freedom of movement and expression. Along the way, this occupation with ourselves generates new stories to immerse ourselves within.
The exhibition Screen, Screen on my Phone, Who’s the Fairest of Them All? is a follow-up on research that Doringer has conducted on the ritual of masking (2007-2018) known under the title FACELESS.