National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Seoul, Museum Madang
30 Samcheong-ro, Jongno-gu, Seoul 03062

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Theory

And so it is by way of a machine that we can then attempt to prefigure both, some kind of future and its denial at the same time. If the prevalent economic system has provided storage of the efforts of the many for the benefit of the few, the machine is both empowerment and substitute of human agency towards the transformation of the world into a home. It should come as no surprise then, that the anticipated fundamental presence in the coming city of impersonalized artificial intelligence is still that of the machine. The unfulfilled promise of modernity in general, and of the Modern Movement in architecture in particular, is that of finally gaining control over the time of our lives, freedom from labor and the possibility to pursue our self-realization and finally attempt to become who we really should have been. The machine is the preeminent tool in that struggle. Perpetual Spring is then intended as both concrete and abstract machine, as a place where the very real parameters of a weather gone awry can be rudimentarily tweaked both as modest example and proposed symbolic ritual, and as the repository collective efforts towards a meta-technology: if the rightful ownership of people’s machines has been confiscated in obsessive fixation with individualism—the antidote for fear—, new machines shall be invented through a popular effort towards an alternative technology.

Praxis

For seven months, between September 16th, 2019 to April 5th, 2020, at the MMCA, The Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art of the city of Seoul, Perpetual Spring will be the site of an urban experiment on social interaction and community organization.

Perpetual Spring is both a public event venue available to all, and a climate-correcting machine acting as a place of public refuge during the city’s months of inclement weather.

Perpetual Spring will offer a program of events addressing issues dear to the inhabitants of the city and will, to that effect, be directly programmed by the people of Seoul. Classes, talks, performances, discussions and meetings of all kinds are expected to take place at Perpetual Spring. Please fill out this form and participate by organizing an event at Perpetual Spring!