About

Clusterduck is an interdisciplinary collective working in the fields of new media studies, design and transmedia, investigating processes and actors behind the creation of Internet-based content. Clusterduck is a germinal collective intelligence born out of the hybridization of online and real-life interactions. Clusterduck is an attempt to mess with social engineering by means of symbolic manipulation. Clusterduck is a bunch of badass guyz and galz who like to waste time online. Clusterduck is the weird kid staring at you from across the virtual schoolyard. Clusterduck is the incidental manifestation of these messed up times. Clusterduck is contemplating the depths of the Internet.

Over the course of past years, Clusterduck has come to build a large network of digital creators, engaging on research chats, groups and initiatives. Clusterduck curated the online exhibition #MEMEPROPAGANDA, hosted by Greencube Gallery, which was presented at The Influencers Festival (Barcelona), Tentacular Festival (Madrid), IFFR (Rotterdam), Urgent Publishing (Amsterdam, Arnheim), Radical Networks (Berlin) and others. Clusterduck is currently developing Meme Manifesto, a transmedia project that collectively explores the occult meanings and communicative potentials of memetic symbology. The first stage of the project has been developed at IMPAKT (NL) during this year’s EMAP/EMARE residency programme and presented at Ars Electronica 2020. Clusterduck also created the participative exhibition #MEMERSFORFUTURE, investigating the role of memetics in the global climate justice movement. The exhibition has been shown at re:publica 2020 and IMPAKT Festival 2020. The group also participated in the 2017 edition of The Wrong Digital Biennale, curating the Berlin pavilion "Internet Fame" together with panke.gallery, and other digital exhibits such as "Make URL self at Home" at Arebyte On Screen and "Pack Your Stuff" on Offsite Project. Clusterduck is currently composed of 5 founders and regular members, and about 20 collaborators spread among different locations worldwide, but mainly based in Europe.

Selected Interviews

Exhibitions

2023-2024 Premio Paul Thorel, Gallerie d’Italia
2022 “DEEP FRIED DUCK” at Caixa Forum (Online)
2022 “#MEMEMANIFESTO” at Villa Arson (Nice-France)
2022 “KidPix” at Media Archeology Lab (Online)
2021 “THE STRUGGLE IS REAL” Greencube Gallery (Online)
2021 #MEMEMANIFESTO at CPDP (Gather Town based).
2021 Clusterduck at Next Cloud Residency, servus.at, Linz.
2020 #MEMEMANIFESTO at Dutch Design Week.
2020 #MEMEMANIFESTO at Onassis Stegi
2020 #MEMEMANIFESTO at IMPAKT Festival 2020 - Zero Footprint
2020 #MEMEMANIFESTO at Ars Electronica.
2020 #MEMEMANIFESTO at EMARE/ EMAP 2020 for IMPAKT.
2020 #MEMEMANIFESTO at Haus der Statistik, Berlin.
2020 #MEMERSFORFUTURE at re:publica festival.
2020 SUCH Bazaar at Internet Yami-Ichi: The Internet Black Market, at Ars Electronica Festival.
2019 SUCH Bazaar at Internet Yami-Ichi: The Internet Black Market, at DAS - Dispositivo Arti Sperimentali, Bologna.
2019 SUCH Bazaar Pop up at The Influencers Festival, CCCB, Barcelona.
2019 SUCH Bazaar at Internet Yami-Ichi, at Basel.
2019 The pool is open at Club Tropicana, Berlin.
2019 "Make URL self at Home" at Arebyte, London.
2019 "Pack Your Stuff" on Offsite Project, The Internet.
2018 SUCH Bazaar at Tentacular Festival, at Matadero, Madrid.
2018 Original Content - L’arte dei meme, at Smart - Polo per L’arte, Rome.
2018 #MEMEPROPAGANDA Goes to Napoli, during spamm philosophy at Mapils Gallery.
2018 #MEMEPROPAGANDA Goes to Rotterdam, during “A trip down the Rabbit Hole”, at International Film Festival Rotterdam.
2018 Original Content - L’arte dei meme, at Smart - Polo per L’arte, Rome.
2018 URL Bazaar at Internet Yami-Ichi, The Internet Black Market, at Matadero, Madrid.
2018 #MEMEPROPAGANDA by Clusterduck hosted by Greencube Gallery.
2018 #MEMEPROPAGANDA at super TOKONOMA, Kassel.
2017 “Internet Fame” by Clusterduck Berlin Pavilon for The Wrong Digital Biennale.
2017 “Internet Fame” by Clusterduck Berlin Embassy for The Wrong Digital Biennale hosted by Panke Gallery as part of Transmediale Vorspiel.

Talks

2023 “Doing things with Crisis” at Transmediale (Berlin)
2023 “From Meme Magic to TikTok Realness: How Platforms are Changing the Game of Online Propaganda” part of Research project “Bildproteste in den Sozialen Medien” at Technische Universität Dresden
2022 #Hypecompass at “ARTIVISM: azioni oltre le rappresentazioni” Viareggio (Italy)
2021 Presenting #MEMEMANIFESTO at CPDP (Gather Town based).
2020 Presenting #MEMEMANIFESTO at IMPAKT FESTIVAL 2020 - Zero Footprint.
2020 Presenting #MEMEMANIFESTO at ARS ELECTRONICA.
2020 Presenting #MEMERSFORFUTURE at re:publica festival.
2020 #MEMEMANIFESTO at Dutch Design Week.
2020 Clusterduck and Participative Reaserch Accademia Santagiulia.
2020 “Memes as performative objects” Universität der Künste, Berlin.
2020 Meme Culture and its Discontents, Heinrich Heine Universität, Düsseldorf.
2019 “Memes as performative objects: From troll wars to Ahegao”, Universität der Künste, Berlin.
2019 “Meme Invasions: From Troll Wars to Influencer Dramas”, Meme Culture and its Discontents, at Heinrich Heine Universität, Düsseldorf.
2019 “Memetic invasions. From troll wars to influencer drama.” at The Influencers Festival, CCCB, Barcelona.
2019 #MEMEPROPAGANDA Goes to Rome, at Macro Asilo - Museo Macro, Roma.
2019 “Invasioni memetiche. Dalle troll wars agli influencers drama.”, during Tour della Catastrofe hosted by NERO Editions, Prato.
2019 Meme as Means - at “Urgent Publishing: New strategies in post-truth times”, hosted by Institute of Network Cultures, ArtEZ University of the Arts and Willem de Kooning Academy, Amsterdam/Arnheim.
2019 “Post Internet Art: dall’archivio al self broadcasting”, hosted by IbridaFestival, Forlì.
2019 #MEMEPROPAGANDA, at Cloud Workers, Accademia delle Belle Arti di Carrara, Carrara.
2019 Internet Memes: Between Propaganda and Myth, at AFO Festival, Olomuc.
2018 “Reactions and Meme Magic”, at “A trip down the Rabbit Hole”, at International Film Festival Rotterdam.
2018 “Gondola vs. Pepe” at Tentacular, Festival de Tecnologias Criticas y Aventuras Digitales, at Matadero, Madrid.
2018 Meme Resistance: Investigating the Role of Critical Networks at the Intersection of Memetics and Social Media Data Analysis - at Radical Networks, Spektrum, Berlin.
2018 “Braincels vs incel tears”, at Empowair Festival, Berlin.
2018 The Great Meme War, at Lago Film Festival, Revine Lago.
2018 “The Language of Meme” at super TOKONOMA, Kassel.

Workshops

2022 #HYPERSTITIONAL COMPASS at SIMPOSIO by NONE, Villaggio Eni, Borca di Cadore.
2021 “Thanks for all the memes | cảm ơn vì tất cả đống meme này” #MEMEMANIFESTO hosted by British Council, Sàn Art, Cultural and Creative Hubs Vietnam.
2021 Stock Memes in #MEMEMANIFESTO, at Screenwalks, The Photographers’ Gallery, London.
2020 #MEMEMANIFESTO Workshop at Freeport, Matadero Madrid.
2020 #HYPERSTITIONAL COMPASS at Haus der Statistik, Berlin.
2019 “Out of the funnel, back to the future”, at The Influencers Festival, CCCB, Barcelona.
2019 #SOMECOMPASS Workshop during Academic Symposium Sharing/Learning - Methods of the Collective hosted by Graduiertenkolleg “Das Wissen der Künste” at Universität der Künste, Berlin.
2019 #SOMECOMPASS at Simposio2019 hosted by NONE Collective at Villaggio Eni, Borca di Cadore.

Franziska Von Guten

Cofounder @franziskavonguten

Franziska is working on a comprehensive archive of digital and new media art. The focus of Franziska’s curation work are avant-garde currents inside online underground groups. She is also leading the development of the collective’s visual identity and design, and tirelessly helping the growth of the nascent Clusternetwork. Outside Clusterduck, Franziska works as Art Director for the Vice motion design team of Snapchat Germany. She curated the Instagram-based art community Post.Vision together with Nicole Ruggiero. When she is bored she creates digital collages. She is a meme-maker and the admin of "just fresh dank memes".

Silvia Dal Dosso

Cofounder @hawaidolphino

Silvia is managing the creative outputs of the collective, creating and curating interactive exhibitions, performative designs, participative workshops, webpages, articles, designs, datasets, MS Paint drawings, main and side quests, secret OPs. The main focus of her research are internet and memetic subcultures. Outside Clusterduck, she work as a freelance creative director and r&d consultant. Random trivia: she wrote/directed ‘The 1Up Fever’ (2013), a mockumentary about Bitcoin and a mysterious AR mobile game, foreseeing the famous Pokémon GO App; she is part of the artistic and music collective Pop x.

Aria Mag

Cofounder @aria_mag

Aria is managing the collective’s various production efforts, selecting and processing information flows, coordinating the collective’s public relations, co-curating the group's artistic activity and the production of filmic projects. Outside Clusterduck, she's a cyborg shaped by the teachings of Antonio Caronia and Paolo Rosa among others, an hacktivist of online and offline social movements, a videom(h)acker whose work has been featured at Triennale di Milano, Fabbrica del Vapore, Blaak 10, Willem De Kooning Academy, Centro Pecci, and displayed on La Repubblica, Rai, Corriere and Digicult.

Noel Nicolaus

Cofounder @noelnicolaus

Noel is assisting the general communication strategy of the collective, contributing to its conceptual framework and theoretical research efforts. He is also involved in social media management and curation, as well as in the organization of events and interdisciplinary project management. Outside Clusterduck, he has been researching in the fields of citizenship and critical urban studies. He is currently working as social media manager and editor. In his spare time, he loves to ponder upon the ironies of history and being a flâneur.

Tommaso Cappelletti

Cofounder @tomatocappelletti

Tomato, native alien of the digital and pop cultural landscape, contributes to the creation and implementation of the visual identity of the collective. He co-manages social media outputs and guerrilla marketing operations. Outside Clusterduck, Tommaso is a Digital Designer and Art Director. He co-founed Nefula, the first Italian studio practicing the Near Future Design methodology. He works in digital design, filmmaking and post-production across Italy, Germany and America.

Selected Articles