Upcoming-Embracing Fallibility: A Neon Exhibition by James Akers
On view: April11-July 19, 2025
Reception, Artist Talk, & Demonstration: Friday April 11, 6-8:30pm
Soul Selling Timer by James Akers
Exhibition Statement
Humans make mistakes. With an elastic definition of success, we are bound to “mess up”. To mistake is to be human, and our own fallibilities make us who we are. In today's era of surveillance and automation to enhance business objectives, human fallibilities are often framed in a negative light, to be replaced by seemingly infallible “machine intelligence”.
Despite its hype bubble, this machine intelligence is no better than us. Made by and trained on the output of humans, it is like us- fallible by design. Humans with limited attention resources are vulnerable to the hype train, buying into the promise of inhuman efficiency. We keep trying to recreate humans with neural networks and AI, but we already have the real thing- us.
Fallible as we may be, there are still many things that humans do to an astonishing level of accuracy. Driving, infrastructure, music and architecture are all done by humans. All of the glass in this exhibition was made by the human who wrote this text. Usually with a paper template that the glass is bent to.
Success and mistake being flexible words, our fallibilities make us irrational and give us empathy, beyond the cold “uncontract” of mechanized interactions. Be it the automated speed camera versus the human police officer, or the automated nudge of a social media algorithm versus people connecting at an event, through friends, or as a part of their daily lives. Our fallibilities and inefficiencies make video possible, make forgetting possible, affecting our perception of “now”.
Our fallible, empathetic nature makes us vulnerable to manipulation, accidents, car crashes and marketing. Fallible humans using, consuming, buying, and voting.
Overall, there are celebrations of human intuition and fallibility throughout the show. From the fallible misinformation arrow playing off of our vulnerability to be manipulated by sensationalized targeted lies, to the improvised riffing of the doodles and tangles. These fallibilities are made more apparent via the inhuman precision of computers. The ever logging and never forgetting defaults, are left behind for basic, buggy web techniques of “touch free” human and sculpture interaction.
Artist Biography
James Akers is a Brooklyn, New York based artist working with glass, computers, and electricity. Akers grew up in Maryland skateboarding, playing guitar and hacking video games. He received a BFA from Alfred University in 2015 and currently operates a neon fabrication company called Nebula Neon with his partner, Ali Feeney. His artwork has been shown in museums, galleries, fairs, and homes around the world.
In his work Akers finds interest in themes of celebration and excess, digital surveillance and influence, consumerism, bliss, and rebellious subversion. He employs a messy approach when designing and assembling his sculptures embracing a “show your work” philosophy. Exploring the idea of a decentralized internet made for and by its users, Akers has recently been programming a series of web-server sculptures as a component to his work outside of the glass studio.
Instagram: @jamesakers2
This exhibition is supported by grant funding from the Art Alliance for Contemporary Glass.