© The Men In Grey

14th Art Division Excellence Award

The Men In Grey

Other [Germany]

The Men In Grey

Outline

This work depicts two mysterious men clad in grey suits and carrying briefcases tightly packed with hardware and software. Using open wireless networks, the men in grey collect and disclose a variety of invisible information that is flooding our environment, and then disappear without a trace. Any open wireless network becomes their stage for a reverse-engineering of network dependence and the implicit trust we place in the metal and minds that make it.

Reason for Award

A work that poses the question “How can we trust the world?”
New technologies transcend and invalidate the various boundaries of public and private, nationality, gender, and wealth disparity that used to divide and govern the existing public space. Yet, this does not mean that the boundaries themselves have ceased to exist. On the contrary, new and previously unheard of boundaries and barriers appear. This reminds us of the fact that it is technology that creates boundaries.
The Men In Grey is a work filled with irony. It suggests that information security and other matters that depend on the reliability of technology cannot be upheld through the means of technology alone, and are gradually turning into something that can be secured only through the respect for truth that lies in the foundation of interpersonal relations since ancient times, and through the internalized relationship of mutual trust. How will security transcend the boundary between internal and external? This is precisely the question “How can we trust the world?”