Cari created an installation exploring the question of how you can exist forever

‘For my installation, I was inspired by torrents: networks through which users exchange digital files,’ says Cari Călinici (student BEAR Fine Art). ‘Each individual object in Preserved, Permafrosted, Perverted contains certain information, but together they tell a much larger story.’ But what exactly connects refrigerators, a video game, a partly fictional story set on the internet forum Reddit, and a chattering set of teeth? In their own way, they all raise the question of whether and how you can exist forever.

The different refrigerators refer to cryonics: the freezing of people (or only their brains) after clinical death. It is seen as a possible form of immortality. Călinici also points to another way in which you might continue to exist forever: through your data remaining online. ‘Immortality may therefore be closer than you think. Your teeth are also a good example of this because they contain so much information: about your age, gender and even diseases.’ Teeth are among the last parts of the human body to decay, which is why they are often used to identify bodies.

Călinici continues: ‘Something that has always fascinated me is that the human mouth contains 32 teeth: exactly the same number of bits many computers operate with.’ This creates a connection between remaining teeth and data that continues to drift around online long after someone has died. ‘What interests me is the boundary between yourself and the devices you use. Where does technology end and where do you begin?’

Your data may continue to circulate long after your death, but even while alive you can already think about the digital traces you leave behind. This becomes clear in the most striking part of the installation: a video game in which you move through the space as Lara Croft from Tomb Raider. Călinici speaks about usership: a term describing how digital avatars can influence both how you feel and how you behave offline. ‘The Lara Croft model used here is exaggeratedly sexualised. It automatically makes you reflect on the role you assign yourself within digital environments.’