bitforms gallery is pleased to announce the New York debut of Slovenian artist duo son:DA (Metka Golec, b. 1972 and Miha Horvat, b. 1976). For their first solo exhibition in the United States, son:DA is showing new configurations from their mouse.computer.drawing series.

Originally drafted by hand using a mouse that leaves a heavy contour line, imagery in the exhibit was manipulated site-specifically. Depicting figures and arrays of remote controls, cabling, computers, cameras and stereo equipment, the overwhelming collage of paper cut outs took two weeks to assemble. Printed and manipulated using everyday 8.5×11” pieces of paper and the regular desktop printer in the bitforms gallery office, the work is a Do It Yourself reflection on modern convenience and tools.

Even mechanical reproduction, at times, does give way to painterly imperfection. Sometimes the printer messed up, the paper jammed and ink ran out. These vulnerable and human spaces of connection fuel son:DA’s otherwise flat utilitarian forms. Tiles of A4 paper in the gallery space activate a cartoony grid of electronic interface along the picture plane, and speak to the impact of pixels on contemporary visual culture.

“Over the years Metka Golec and Miha Horvat created their own artistic language centered around the signal-to-noise ratio and the illusion of connectivity through modern day technology,” writes Peter Tomaz Dobrila of kibla.org. “Their installations, which they combine with graphical interventions, consist of broken wires, incompatible plugs and sockets, wrongly connected cables and stripped hardware. The line between parody and reality of today’s networks has never been as thin.”

son:DA have participated in numerous exhibitions and festivals throughout Europe. Past solo exhibitions of their work have included LaVitrine, Pekarna, Slovenia; Miklovi hisi Ribnica and Skuc Gallery, Ljubljana, Slovenia; Mali Galeriji, Ljubljana, Slovenia; Kibla, Maribor; Turner Contemporary, Margate, UK; C-O Care of, Milan; AP4-Art, Lugano; Razstavni salon Rotovz, Maribor; ARCO, Madrid; and Porschehof & Kunstverein, Salzburg. son:DA’s work has also been exhibited at Kunstraum Bethanien, Berlin; Bienale Neodvisne Ilustracije, UGM Maribor, Slovenia; Kunstlerhaus Vienna and Graz, Austria; Ground Zero Gallery, curated by Maurizio Cattelan, Arta-Terme, Italy; Press to Exit Project Space, Skopje, Macedonia; Complesso di San Michele, Rome; Museum of Modern Art, Ljubljana; MGLC Ljubljana; Sonambiente, Berlin; Museum of Art, Lendava; The 6th Baltic Biennale of Contemporary Art, Szczecin, Poland; Trienale Ekologija in Umetnost, UGM Maribor, Slovenia; XI Biennale dei Giovani Artisti dell’Europa e del Mediterraneo, Castel S. Elmo, Naples; Versus XI, curated by L Tadorni, Velan Center for Contemporary Art, Turin; Moderna Galerija, Ljubljana; 26th Biennale of Graphical Arts, Tobacna Tovarna, Ljubljana; State Museum of Contemporary Art, Solun; Institute for Contemporary Art, Sofia; MACRO al Mattatoio, Rome; Blut und Honig, curated by Harold Szeemann, Essl Collection, Vienna; Semperdepot, Vienna; Galerie Westlicht; Vienna. Selected screenings include The Kitchen, New York; The Renaissance Society, Chicago; Tate Modern, London; Contemporary Art Museum, St. Louis; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Festival of World Theatre, Zagreb; Human Rights Film Festival, Zagreb; Entermultimediale2, Prague; Pixxelpoint, Dom Kulture, Gorizia; Mestna Galerija, Nova Gorica; International Animation Festivals of Izola, Ljubljana, Zagreb, Utrecht, and Hiroshima; Zebra-poetry Film Festival, Berlin; and the International Festival of Computer Arts, Maribor, Slovenia.