areyouforreal.ifa.de
ARE YOU FOR REAL platform
ARE YOU FOR REAL. Platform
The ongoing web-based project ARE YOU FOR REAL was launched by ifa – Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen in 2020, and curated by Julia Grosse, Paula Nascimento, and Yvette Mutumba until 2023. The second phase was shaped curatorially by Giulia Bini and Lívia Nolasco-Rózsás from 2023 until 2025 and accompanied by an extemsive online mediation program. During this phase, six new clusters of works were added and will be on display in a travelling exhibition from 2026 onwards.
7 Stops
1 ⁄ 3
35 Artists
1 ⁄ 3
6 Contributors
Lívia Nolasco-Rózsás,
Giulia Bini,
Paula Nascimento ,
Yvette Mutumba,
Julia Grosse ,
Concept
Nina Frohm,
Project Management ifa
About the exhibiton
Are you for real? It would be an odd question to ask if we didn’t have technologies at hand capable not only of representing but generating realities. Computation propels a shift in our understanding of what “real” is, and how it should be distinguished from the merely possible, the virtual, and the actual.
Realities can be constructed by calculating machines as much as by the scientific activity that shapes how we perceive our digital and analog life-worlds. The understanding that computation and scientific investigation are two main forces that define our realities lies at the core of ifa’s ARE YOU FOR REAL digital platform.
The featured artists use computers as tools, as collaborators, and as agents of world creation. They base their works on the results of scientific research, while also borrowing and transforming its methods in their investigations. The different perspectives enable us to grasp various aspects of digitalization, and to explore a reality now irreducibly entangled with the online sphere.
