CeCiL's Box by Stephen Korytko

CeCiL's Box by Stephen Korytko

With the CeCiL's Box, the Cercle Cité supports local creation by presenting and promoting the work of emerging and young artists from the Greater Region in one of its shop windows in the Rue du Curé. This mini exhibition space, visible 7 days a week, day and night, offers a street-side location in the heart of the city to a series of original and ephemeral interventions from the plastic and applied arts, with the aim of arousing the curiosity of passers-by and questioning the collective imagination.

The 30th intervention, entrusted to artist Stephen Korytko, is entitled REGÆN.

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In a world where digital dominates,

I yearn for the tactile, the tangible, the real.

Reclaiming art through analog processes

Is a return to craftsmanship and intentionality.

Through film, darkroom, and manual labor,

We connect with our materials and our history.

We embrace imperfections, happy accidents,

And the unique beauty of the handmade.

REGÆN is a film and photography piece

It is a celebration of the physicality of things,

And a recognition of its power.

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Regæn is an attempt to snatch back the near-future and invite everyone to ponder the relentless march of "forever progress" with a nod towards the past. We're in an era where AI-generated artistic content is a wild beast, still untamed and unregulated. It's a wild concoction of decades of mashed-up pop culture. Art created by machine learning, right now, is like a ship without a captain, a source of anxiety for us all.

Stephen's aim? To follow the same unpredictable path but with a twist, by using equipment and technology from what we see as being simpler times. Just like an AI would, the visuals draw inspiration from the classics. Elements from films such as Metropolis, Ghost in the Shell and Matrix were blended together to create something ‘new'. But the use of super 8mm film and 35mm photography adds an intentional note of nostalgia; encouraging the audience to witness the existential crisis of generated art through the cozy prism of the familiar.

What to take away from it? That is your prerogative.

Stephen likes to believe it's a testament to the things that stay constant amidst the whirlwind of this new industrial revolution. Our individual reluctance to change is what will inherently make us human forever.

Regæn is an attempt to reclaim a future that, truth be told, was probably doomed from the get-go.

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We invite you to meet-up with the artist in front of the CeCiL's Box on Thursday September 14 at 12 p.m.

Share your images on Facebook and Instagram! #cecilsbox

Programming: Marion Vergin and Iyoshi Kreutz

© Stephen Korytko