Goldin+Senneby: Flare-Up

Drawing on the experience of living with multiple sclerosis, the exhibition’s title refers to a treatable aspect of the disease. While the gradual progression of the condition offers limited options for intervention, the sudden flare-ups have attracted significant interest from the pharmaceutical industry, paving the way for lucrative treatments. Flare-Up also alludes to the volatile, inflammable nature of pine resin, which has fueled investment in genetically engineered pines as a potential source of green energy. 

Since 2018, Goldin+Senneby has collaborated with fiction writer Katie Kitamura, blending their artistic practice with her narrative craft to explore themes of autoimmunity—the fraught notion of a body at war with itself—and the stakes of reengineering life to defend against biological or environmental peril. Goldin+Senneby’s research, experiments, and performances have inspired Kitamura’s fiction, which, in turn, has influenced the duo’s artistic output. Flare-Up is also the working title of their collaborative novel, commissioned and edited by Triple Canopy, which has published several manifestations of the work. The novel is composed of two discrete parts set in parallel versions of the same world: One centers on a mysterious pine tree with a supercharged immune system, while the other follows a stranger whose identity and biological coherence are called into question as he searches for a groundbreaking treatment for his illness.