Sandra Zanetti
Only Brush the Teeth You Want to Keep

As part of the ARV.I artist residency program, Sandra Zanetti concludes her artist-in-residence with a solo exhibition, titled Only Brush the Teeth You Want to Keep, at Gallery Heerz Tooya.

Working with mixed media, Sandra Zanetti's practice grasps technology today as a pivot in human evolution in the cultural, historical, and political context. After a month's stay in Bulgaria, looking to the post-digital Eastern European landscape for aesthetic inspiration, the exhibition Only Brush the Teeth You Want to Keep explores the hegemony of Western exceptionalism and directs the dynamics of tangible and intangible practices in the globalizing post-net ecosphere.

The development of a neo-Schumpeterian world economy, combined with the power structures prevalent in the digital ecosphere, is rapidly leading to the rise of a single history with a strong preference of western practices, semiotics, languages, currencies, and traditions.

The digital revolution is dramatically impacting the development of globalized culture and the interactions within it. The amount of digitalized information affects systems of communication around the world. As a society, we humans continuously choose to wiggle between preserving and thoughtlessly discard what defines us as a species.

At the hand of the spread of Western capitalism and intense levels of corruption, the Eastern Bloc is watching its landscape shift west both ideologically and aesthetically in order to fit the mold of what it is to be a European nation. The European Union uses the statement "united in diversity" yet clearly prioritizes the preservation of western culture over those of the eastern bloc in its physical and digital ecosphere. Non-western cultures could face a similar fate to the extinction of several cultures with the invention of the printing press in the 1400s if their preservation is not extended into the digital ecosphere. As this mythology of Western superiority disseminates into the psyche of the East, its motherland suffers.

- Sandra Zanetti / Artist Statement

Born at the turn of the century in Chicago, USA, Sandra Zanetti is an artist, curator, and writer. She utilizes a variety of hardware, software and new media techniques to produce critical commentary on the the cyclical friction of the physical, political, and psychological landscapes shaped by the evolution of technological advances throughout time. As a point of departure, she often looks to the history of civilizations prior, in comparison to the complexities of her own identity forged by the Digital Revolution. Sandra is an alumna of The Universität der Kunst Berlin, Paris College of Art as well as the University of Central Florida. Her work has been exhibited, and published throughout Europe, Asia, and North America. Currently, she serves as the director of the DIY space Parkhaus15, and is in residence at ARV.International in Vishovgrad, Bulgaria this summer. www.sandrazanetti.com

The exhibition is supported by the Municipality of Veliko Turnovo. Many thanks to Tequila Bar Funky Monkey and Pernod Ricard for serving free drinks at the vernissage.