Bergen Centre for Electronic Arts

The work Mean Time, 2011 is controlled by a computer, which continuously retrieves information about traffic on the Internet and the speed of the dials is determined by the global Internet activity. When the activity on the Internet is high, the clocks go faster, when the activity is lower, they go slower. The clocks will therefore be guided by human activity, and not be defined by an “invisible hand” or fluctuations in crystals or atoms.



The clocks are railway station clocks with two clock faces. Efforts to synchronize and standardize, not to mention establishing a global time is historically linked to the development of the railway network by the end of the 1800s, a process that is also related to the unfolding of capitalism and ideas of progress. As the railroad was responsible for an altered temporality for over a hundred years ago, from several local to one global time divided into time zones, the Internet is about to change our perception of time – both the time we use working in front of our computers and how humans in different places are connected day and night in a new time zone.

Toril Johannessen (1978, NO) has an MA from the Art Academy in Bergen. Recent group exhibitions include: Space. About a Dream at Kunsthalle Wien, The End of Money at Witte de With in Rotterdam, Run, Comrade, The Old World is Behind You, Kunsthall Oslo, all in 2011. Toril Johannessen lives and works in Bergen.

The show is supported by Norwegian Art Council, Vederlagsfondet and BEK – Bergen Center for Electronic Art.