The Sprawl: Metahaven & Benedict Singleton

Originally conceived of at the intersection of several crises—the outbreak of Ebola, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, and the rise of the Islamic State (IS)—Metahaven’s new work The Sprawl takes as its subject the escalation of global unrest suggested by this conflation. Following their short films, notably City Rising (2014) and music videos with techno musician Holly Herndon, The Sprawl moves into the territory of documentary art film. Described by Metahaven as “propaganda about propaganda,” their partially Russian-spoken documentary features interviews with Benjamin H. Bratton, Monalisa Gharavi, and Peter Pomerantsev, connected by provocative, lyrical, and mysterious visual interjections. Parts of the work will be shown during the evening alongside an informal, personal, and in-depth conversation between Metahaven and strategist Benedict Singleton, providing an insight into how The Sprawl has been created at, in their words, “a particularly perilous and seductive intersection of politics and aesthetics.”