Being there

I have an essay, “The World Beyond the Screen,” in the catalog for the current exhibition Being There at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Denmark. The essay begins:

The paradox of modern media is that in opening the world to us, it removes us from the world. To enjoy the informational and recreational bounties of the networked screen, whether it’s a television, a personal computer, or a smartphone, we have to withdraw from our immediate physical and social surroundings. Our mind, with i...