Have technical devices originally designed to fulfil our wishes already enslaved us, or will they in the future? Or is it the other way round and they are opening up new ways of thinking, acting and producing? How can we regard objects, and in particular technical devices, as cultural objects? From March to May, brut and Kunsthalle Wien enter a co-operation based on the exhibition The Promise of Total Automation. As part of this co-operation, brut shows a collaborative piece of Swiss artist Philippe Decrauzat and New York-based musician Alan Licht as well as a performance by Korean artist Geumhyung Jeong. There are also talks with both artists and a tour through the exhibition guided by the curator.

From March 11^th to May 29^th, the exhibition The Promise of Total Automation at Kunsthalle Wien explores how the promise in question has turned into the optimisation of the individual and his or her environment in capitalism – and which strategies we can employ to counter that. Automation and improvisation, the fascination with all that is tech-related and the criticism of its exploitation are not opposing poles but mutually dependent. The artists of the exhibition look at technology in its complexity but also regarding its involvement in rational and irrational forces. Ritual objects, production machines, technical devices, images and artworks tell the tale of digital-age archaeology, portray utopias of a technological future and attempt to draft a new togetherness within our eco-system.