BETATESTERS
With relentless curiosity, the Betatesters push the physical possibilities of materials to reveal many an answer to the age-old question: “What if?” Inherently enhanced, this group makes 2.0 versions of so-called traditional objects. Pulled toward innovation, they maintain an unwavering devotion to a specific, often single material or form, but hack, exploit, or optimize them in distinctive and mesmerizing ways. The Betatesters also convey varying levels of deception in their work, especially through internet-adjacent aesthetics that define the millennial generation and belie the role of the hand.
Engaging in material subversion and innovation through a collision between craft and the by-products of the post-digital world, the Betatesters generate a puzzling indistinction between human and machine. However, for these makers, technology does not replace the hand—it leverages it. Their collective inclinations also indicate a shift in norm about material sourcing within an ever-growing systems-oriented world and pose intriguing questions about the potential refuse of the future. What might we possibly make of it?
Betatesters include: Vincent Pocsik, Jolie Ngo, Joyce Lin, Matthew Szösz, Mallory Weston, Brian Oakes, Adam Grinovich, Layla Klinger
