Pharmakon, 2017
Corrupt Blood Incident at South Kiosk
Landscape, digital failure, and viral transmission.
‘In September 2005 a virtual plague now known as the ‘Corrupted Blood Incident’ spread across the online role-playing video game World of Warcraft. Caused by a glitch in a recently added mission, the pandemic rapidly eliminated lower level characters, drastically impacting normal game play. Throughout the chaos of the incident, programmers imposed quarantines and players took independent measures such as abandoning densely populated cities to avoid infection. Despite this, the virus continued to spread for over a week until fixed by the game’s developers. The event attracted the attention of epidemiologists as an example for how human populations might respond in the case of a real-world outbreak.’
Press Release
Pharmakon is comprised of a marbled black urn and porcelain apothecary jar. It takes its name from the Greek, meaning both remedy and poison.
My contemporary apothecary jar is engraved with the chemical formula for Zopiclone, an anti anxiety and insomnia medication with a dark side. It forms part of a series questioning the way and the reasons we self medicate.
‘South Kiosk is a Peckham based art space dedicated to the exhibition and screening of moving image work. Founded in 2013 by Ben Evans James, Dave Charlesworth and Jake Biernat, South Kiosk is a not-for profit organisation.’
South Kiosk
Curator: David Charlesworth
Gallery South Kiosk, London
Artists: Alzbeta Jaresova, Angela Washko, Daniel Shanken, Jamie Shovlin, Joey Holder, Richard Whitby, Tom Kobialka, Tobias Revell and William Martin.