ISSUE NO. 3: CRASH TEST DUMMY

Group Exhibition | 19.19. - 3.11.2012
Participating Artist: Anton Peitersen, Filippos Kavakas, Jennifer Chan, Lars Teichmann, Marcus Scheunemann, Peter Feiler, Petja Ivanova, Susi Mehl
Installation view

Jonathon Keats | SEDUCTIONS | 09.11. - 17.11.2012
Installation view


Imagine Jesus was a crash test dummy.

1. Anthropometry
The dummy should have similar shape, mass distribution and joint articulation to that of the human.

2. Biofidelity
The dummy should duplicate the biomechanical response behaviour of a living human exposed to the same conditions.

3. Measurement Capability
The dummy should be instrumented to provide measurements of appropriate forces, moments, deflections and accelerations.

4. Repeatability
The dummy should give the same response (output) to the same impact (input) conditions for repeated tests.

5. Reproducibility
Different dummies of the same design should give identical responses to similar impacts.

6. Durability
Durability implies that the dummy should remain structurally sound following an impact and,
moreover, its responses must remain biofidelic and repeatable.

7. Sensitivity
The dummy should not be sensitive to extraneous conditions such as temperature and humidity effects that would affect its biofidelity and repeatability.

8. Simplicity and Ease of Use
The dummy should be easy to calibrate, require minimal external support equipment and be readily reparable.

(AGARD Advisory Report 1996; NATO Research and Technology Organisation)

It is a basic human condition to test things in order to gain knowledge, to understand a situation. Some of these actions can be very painful – like the child touching the hotplate for the first time. Yet other tests produce pleasure and are repeated. Being able to test and repeat “first” actions in order to predict an outcome, together with the possibility of not being directly affected – i.e. modeling – may be part of the human narrative of infinite life. Modeling can thus be understood not so much as a process of mapping reality but rather as a mapping of future or – also – a mapping of the past.

Anthropomorphic test devices (ATD) are used to test boundaries. Their behaviour is closely analysed, the recorded data evaluated. Usually, each dummy is designed to represent a particular population. Ideally, that population will be the one that is expected to experience the environment in which the dummy is tested. Many of the currently used dummies are based on population surveys conducted in the 1950s and 1960s. More recent surveys were commissioned particularly by the French military, the US Army or thought descendants of eugenic practitioners. Hybrid III, developed in 1977 and finalized in 1997, is still the most up-to-date industry standard to comply with government frontal impact regulations.

The artists presented in Issue No. 3 CRASH TEST DUMMY were not born or barely reached the hotplate when HYBRID III made its way. CRASH TEST DUMMY re-shapes the idea of the test device. The data displayed renders impact and crash, fractures and bends as an aesthetic practice. It is personal data, data that is not striving to secure a system but on the contrary to splinter the set of conditions marked as environment. Crisis and values, structures and styles are differently "incorporated" in these dummies at work. It could be called something like their practice for emergency without the practice, without the safety belt. Anticipate, imagine and navigate through God porn made at CERN, hot biscuit china and objects of good-natured ridicule.