Dark Finitude is an interactive sound based and nonvisual web-exhibition by the Estonia-based artist Sten Saarits hosted by post-gallery.online. The exhibition is essentially a dark screen that welcomes viewers on an auditory journey taking place in a nighttime forest setting, accompanied by a voice addressing the boundless, curved and unknown landscape. Dark Finitude has no true ending or a beginning. The set up is much like a sandbox game where the visitor has an option to construct their own route by clicking on different areas of the screen on their handheld or desktop devices. Every click takes the participant further on a chosen path and a sound clip accompanies every advancement. The exhibition incorporates a vast amount of voice recordings presented by actor Loveday Smith (UK/NL) supported by field recordings and original musical scores by Sten Saarits. The night provides a pause to the busy daytime, much like a dark screen contrasts the visually overloaded web environment. Similar to sensory deprivation, the mind can become extremely active in reverberating consumed media (books, articles, films, etc.) in these conditions. Dark Finitude is a spacial representation of this unconstrained and uncurated stream of thoughts fueled by unstable political times. Navigating on handheld or desktop devices is the same – you click or tap on four areas of the dark screen: far left, center left, center right, far right. Every click provides you with four new options to choose from. Headphones or standalone speakers are recommended. While the exhibition is tested on all popular browsers, we recommend using Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox. The journey is finite but it’s a vicious circle at the same time. Voice acting by Loveday Smith (UK/NL) Programming by Kelli Gedvil (EE) Managed by Kristen Rästas (EE) Supported by Cultural Endowment of Estonia Sten Saarits (born 1987 in Tallinn, Estonia) is an Estonian artist who works with various media, such as sound, video, installations, performance, and sculpture. His audio-visual work often incorporates a recurring pattern or have a looped nature, and even though in flux, his narratives resist progress over time and therefore embody a sculptural presence. While his work has a poetic and aesthetically pleasing presence, themes of cultural idleness are often handled with a sense of drama and humour. Saarits graduated masters at the New Media Arts department at the Estonian Academy of Arts, a department focused on sound art studies. Previously he has studied installation and sculpture at the Estonian Academy of Arts and sound art, performance and filmmaking at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. Sten has exhibited his work and been involved with group projects in Estonia, Austria, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, France, the Netherlands and Lithuania. He is also a member of the sound art duo SSSS.
The exhibition is open 22.07.-23.09.2021
