Jean Shin Invites Viewers to 'Pause' With E-Waste Sculptures

We can’t escape technology (especially here in the Bay Area), and artists have long been grappling with its applications and effects. Yerba Buena Center for the Arts’ exhibition The Body Electric highlights both historic and contemporary works that address physical technologies, while the artists in the de Young’s Uncanny Valley: Being Human in the Age of AI look at the invisible algorithms that govern our lives. Across town, in a new commission for the Asian Art Museum, New York artist Jean Shin’s Pause assembles an installation from discarded e-waste (cell phones, smartphones, laptops and cables) to evoke the contemplative space of a garden retreat. Through abundance, she makes the environmental and psychic realities of technological progress tangible. –Sarah Hotchkiss