The installation titled „Worldformator“ by Winterthur artist Mia Diener (*1982) explores the fields that open up between manual work and virtual reality on the one hand, and between efficient hard work and destruction, on the other hand. Serially, Diener prints an identical world map on paper – the numbers 0 and 1 are then printed on these maps, manually. While she is at work, her hands mutate into mechanically functioning tools
questioning playfully the difference between man and machine. On top of that, the boundaries between the unique and the mass-market product begin to blur, bit by bit.
The series of ones and zeros – that is the binary code –, is the basis for the processing of digital information on computers. The many different dimensions of our world are measured on the basis of numbers: everything is attached a certain importance or value by man.
Our modern, digital electronic communication is operated by algorithms, by mathematical
programming; which is also what happens when we, with the aid of algorithm-based navigation devices, let ourselves guide through cities. By printing a loose series of ones and zeros, Diener reinterprets both the real and the virtual world, creating an individual product the significance of
which resists rational categorisation. The spectator is thus guided by the artist through a playfully devised world that is freed from all number-related operations.
Whereas logic and the processing of binary codes are located in a kind of invisible virtual world, the output of computing is often real. A big industrial shredder plays a dominant role in „Worldformator“, representing the transience of everything man creates. Raucously, the machine destroys the manual labour. The violent gesture of destruction is underlined by the racket of the machine. And yet, destruction means transformation as well. The shredder vomits the fanfold
paper in stripes and three-dimensional, delicately coloured shapes are generated by these thin stripes. Diener’s thoughts and actions can still be found in them awaiting a re-interpretation in the eye of the observer.
