Johanna Hedva Undermines Capitalist Agency

‘And the Human, Stuck in a Permanent State of Smelling like Dirt,’ reads the AI-authored statement greeting visitors to Berlin-based artist Johanna Hedva’s solo exhibition, ‘If You’re Reading This, I’m Already Dead’, curated by Suzy Halajian at JOAN, Los Angeles. The candid physicality of this opening proclamation hints at the show ahead: a series of assemblages formed from, among other things: knives previously thrown at the walls of Berlin’s Gropius Bau as part the 2022 group exhibition ‘YOY! Care, Repair, Heal’; a fake pelvis bone; a mouth-blown glass vessel filled with black pigment; and organic matter including the artist’s hair, blood and saliva. By interweaving these elements, Hedva creates a self-contained universe composed of distinct, raw works that – straddling political and spiritual realms – reflect the artist’s efforts to grapple with conventional Western perspectives on power and domination.

The exhibition’s integration of AI and machine tools resonates with Hedva’s interest in rethinking how ‘dominant capitalist ideologies’, to quote the press release, assign value to materials perceived as lacking agency. Here, Hedva uses technology to grant autonomy to inanimate objects, so they transcend their typical realms. For instance, in Sex Is Over (all works 2023), a customized pedal-power system with contact microphones is connected to a synthetic pelvis bone, enabling it to produce sound through touch. Completed by a lunar moth suspended from the ceiling by a piano string, the sculpture merges the mystical and the scientific, suggesting reincarnation while producing sound controlled by an Arduino programmed to interpret astronomical data, including the Saros cycle series. Another piece, The Clock Is Always Wrong (Other Mouth), comprises a vessel shaped like an alien organ filled with viscous black pigment. Suspended by chains, it has two holes in its base through which the liquid gradually drips. This mesmerizing slow leak evokes a local conception of temporality outside of standard time-keeping practices, with the artist having precisely planned the work to completely empty as the exhibition draws to a close.

The fact that the show is being hosted by JOAN adds a further layer of significance. Founded in 2015 by three female curators – Summer Guthery, Gladys-Katherina Hernando and Rebecca Matalon – the non-profit space has showcased the work of more than 140 artists, the majority of whom identify as women, non-binary or LGBTQ+, whose experimental practices exist outside of commercial contexts.

Growing up in Los Angeles, Hedva was deeply immersed in and influenced by an array of spiritual practices through their family. In resonance with these traditions, the exhibition presents a selection of eerie, almost evanescent, wall-hung works, all marked by the artist’s body. Harder, for instance, is a large, bone-white sheet of paper impaled on the wall with eight knives. Positioned alongside a piece of silk containing the artist’s blood and strands of their hair are three silicone urethral sounds, resembling railroad spikes. The work also includes a handwritten list of jiu-jitsu commands. Through embracing injuries, wounds and scars – rather than seeking to erase or hide them, whether metaphorically or literally – this assemblage invites us to reconsider our understanding of ability by illustrating the potential to exist simultaneously across dominance and vulnerability.

Johanna Hedva’s ‘If You’re Reading This, I’m Already Dead’ is on view at JOAN, Los Angeles until 3 February

_{Main image: Johanna Hedva’s ‘If You’re Reading This, I’m Already Dead’, 2023, installation view. Courtesy: the artist and JOAN, Los Angeles}