Reproduction Guild

Peter Deckers

Jeweller to the Reproduction Guild

Members

Copiers, cloners, image reproducers, manuscript duplicators, forgers, scanners, reverse engineers, software pirates, dental technicians, production manufacturers

Patron Saint

Pygmalian

See Peter's extensive notes on the work.

Email Peter Deckers about the guild.

The presence of a Reproduction Guild could have a weighty importance in this day and age of post-industrial corporate domination. The ‘digital’ world turns data into digital information, regardless of content or moral doctrines. The work uses pixilated portraits of significant figures from the computer industry and is accompanied by a composition of noise and voice samples.

The ‘manual’ copiers can be divided into groups of craftspeople occupied in replication. Copying manuscripts under the scrupulous control of a religious order has changed through the centuries to reproduction within the laws of copyright. While ownership is protected, it is also challenged and manipulated through the skill of counterfeiters and copyists. The signature rings contain signatures of famous artists. The sound is mixed from interviews with relevant experts.

Mass production is delicately linked with industrial economy, mass profits, economic growth and the ultimate: political stability. Through the collapse of the twin towers the economy seems more then ever related and affected by the nature of political order. The 220 steel badges stands for the amount of destroyed floors of the world trade centre. In the string of sound, a laser cutter is ‘manufacturing’ those plates, while the economic expert re-evaluates.

‘Processed’ copying introduces cloning and genetic engineering, but also its counterpart is natural growth and procreation. The trophy-ring awards the ruthless scientist with a synthetic sapphire. The sampled interviews are about issues of its moral and ethical validation.