Olga Kisseleva 02-11-2015
“How are you?” is a question that seems so simple as it is understood in the West, since it is no more than an introduction to language or a sign of recognition. We do not really answer. In Russia, you do not ask the question unless you want a full detailed response. The original project in 1998 was only on Internet. An incongruous answer came from Yugoslavia on Christmas Eve: ‘I’m afraid the NATO bomb attack!’ We know what happened there next… This event determined the current project “How are you?” It is a video of responses filmed in three distinct places: The 48th Venice Biennale, the Tashilhumpo Monastery in Tibet and Silicon Valley in California. The answers reveal the extent to which places condition the people met, from the blasé contemporary art critic at the Venice Biennale to the radiant Buddhist monk in oppressed Tibet to the extremely frustrated young executives in Silicon Valley, who interpret this simple question as an attack.
Olga Kisseleva: How are you?, 02-11-2015, in: Archive of Digital Art “How are you?” is a question that seems so simple as it is understood in the West, since it is no more than an introduction to language or a sign of recognition. We do not really answer. In Russia, you do not ask the question unless you want a full detailed response. The original project in 1998 was only on Internet. An incongruous answer came from Yugoslavia on Christmas Eve: ‘I’m afraid the NATO bomb attack!’ We know what happened there next… This event determined the current project “How are you?” It is a video of responses filmed in three distinct places: The 48th Venice Biennale, the Tashilhumpo Monastery in Tibet and Silicon Valley in California. The answers reveal the extent to which places condition the people met, from the blasé contemporary art critic at the Venice Biennale to the radiant Buddhist monk in oppressed Tibet to the extremely frustrated young executives in Silicon Valley, who interpret this simple question as an attack.