Ahree Lee: Fabrication

Ahree Lee’s immersive installation, Fabrication, considers the intersection of technology, labor, and gender through three components: TEXTILE 1.0, Binary System, and Tomorrow, Today. Each of these works explore signifiers of gendered labor encoded within 20th century modernist technological frameworks. With its flashing lights and modular design, the fictional domestic apparatus, TEXTILE 1.0, parodies the utopian mindset of mid-century design. Resembling both an early main- frame computer and an efficient kitchenette, the structure blurs the lines between domestic and industrial production and questions where social value is located. In Binary System, Lee projects digital code across woven panels, pointing to the shared use of binary code in weaving and computer programming. The Jacquard loom, for example, implemented a punch card system to dictate textile designs based on the interlocking patterns created by alternating warp and weft threads. Lee’s weaving practice connects the highly technical, algorithmic operation of weaving—traditionally considered women’s work—with the role women have played in developing computer science. Until mid-century, computer programmers, operators, and software developers were almost exclusively women. Using clips from 20th century films and advertisements, Tomorrow, Today narrates the cultural representation and re-inscription of gender roles in relation to technological development during this formative period.

With its exploration of sociotechnical development, Fabrication asks us to imagine what an alternative future could look like if technology had evolved differently in iithe 20th century. The artist proposes, what if “computers had retained more of their connection to weaving looms, not just the punch card, and the female domination of computer programming hadn’t ended in the mid-century. If those working in and controlling the technology industry had been from a wider representation of society, then would we have the tools and products that served more of our needs? Would the technology industry and its products be less intimidating and monolithic and more human and welcoming?”