NO NO NSE NSE

Science fiction is a recurring theme in Sutela’s work. So is the quest to go beyond the limits of human-created language, both by delving into artificial intelligence and machine learning, and by turning towards technologies as shamanistic devices or possible mediums to channel alien semantics.

NO NO NSE NSE is the artist’s first major solo show. 

Sutela’s work urges us to consider other, nonhuman, species as intelligent beings, such as the Physarum polycephalum slime mould. An organism without a brain or a heart, it is nonetheless able to learn and is used, among others, to study complex human infrastructures such as the Tokyo railway network. Sutela proposes her collaboration with slime moulds as a model against anthropocentric hierarchies, to point instead to decentralised intelligence and a deep connectivity of consciousness and the material world—both living and non-living.

Her latest projects look in particular into non-deterministic models of computers and algorithms. Sutela experiments both with inserting fermenting foods into the “guts” of a computer to generate unforeseeable reactions, and with the random bubbles of lava lamps, which have lately been used to encrypt data.

For NO NO NSE NSE, Sutela produced new photograms of lava lamps she created in the shape of her own head, pointing to psychedelic technologies and neuroplasticity. In Sutela’s work, technologies transcend physical and immaterial boundaries. The exhibition, produced by Kunsthall Trondheim, and adapted by the artist for Oslo Kunstforening, invites viewers to approach machines not as models or expansions of the human mind, but on their very own terms.

The exhibition at Oslo Kunstforening is supported by FINNO – The Finnish-Norwegian Cultural Institute.

The exhibition was produced by Kunsthall Trondheim, where it was on view between March 4 and August 29, 2020. Text for the website are by Stefanie Hessler, director Kunsthall Trondheim.

The publication Jenna Sutela – NO NO NSE NSE is published by Kunsthall Trondheim, Serpentine Galleries and Koenig Books. With support from Finsk-Norsk Kulturinstitutt, Kulturrådet and Oslo Kunstforening.