Philip Topolovac (lives and works in Berlin) has often dealt with the perception and conditions of social reality in his previous work. The project ‘Universe 21’ was prepared in collaboration with the Austrian curator Markus Proschek. The exhibition includes the work Prophets, which thematizes the transience of experiencing states of human consciousness, whereby ‘ecstatic experience’ means escape from the world and total existence at the same time.

The UNIVERSE 21 exhibition consists of closed segments. It seems that they are strangers to each other and that we will hardly find areas of contact between them. The objects remind us of something with their visuality. Something archetypal that we can perceive. Shapes carry with them ideas stored deep in the subconscious. If the relationships between them work, then we find that there is a technological drama encoded into the exhibition. It unfolds on several levels and can, depending on the sensitivity of the viewer, end in an almost ecstatic experience.

Let's look first at Berghain. A club specialising in electronic music.
The mecca of dance music. An industrial former power station building. What could be a better example of the fusion of technology and ecstasy? "Beauty and transience", the transience of time, the intensity of experience, the ecstatic experience. This is the name of the film made in 2019 about Sven Marquardt, the iconic figure of this club. The question behind it is precisely: Is the building and the experience of ecstasy only accessible to the chosen few?

And who were the chosen ones in ethologist John B. Calhouse? Originally young, then desocialized individuals who had lost the ability to interact with each other. The technology of their lives was engineered by a scientist. To prepare them for the living conditions that so-called Western society would later impose on itself. Prosperity, absolute abundance and plenty. In this environment, the will to live was extinguished. And whether the experiment was about paradise or hell, let's admit that interpretation plays a big role. Calhouse's idea of a mouse paradise was a human idea, do we know anything about the mouse?

Octogon ex voto suscepto, "on the basis of a public promise". What was the promise of this mousetrap? Originally a promise of knowledge: what lies behind the fulfilled dream of a perfect life? Whoever once longs for knowledge, even of himself, cannot lose his way. Calhoun made many attempts. The result was only misery and destruction. But the object on display is magnificent. Technical sophistication and impeccable craftsmanship give it dignity. Let's leave aside the scientific experiments. Is it the architecture of the future? An abstract image? A technology capable of movement?

Titanic is another component of the exhibition that forces us to think about the relationship between technology and human perception - both are presented to the viewer in a liminal zone both visually and emotionally. The most famous ship ever to set sail on the ocean.
She sank in 1912 and the 1997 film gave the legend a new unadulterated romantic visuality.

Hentai is the term for the harder pornography of Japanese cartoons. Reminiscences - references to these films were created by collage-like references to the visual surface. They are handled in a playful, mischievous way, and so they were treated in the installation as they were arranged in space.

The other two segments - plaster heads that levitate in the gallery space like mute excited spectators, and luminescent animated zeppelin aggregates that hover like magical alien machines - tempt us to look for harmony between biological structures and biotechnology.

Berghain is one of the most famous nightclubs in the world, located in a former power station building on the border of Berlin's Kreuzberg and Friedrichshain districts. The club is famous, among other things, for its entry requirements, which are determined by the bouncers according to appearance, behaviour or language, for example. The club's main bouncer is photographer Sven Marquardt, about whom two documentaries were made in 2019 - Berlin Bouncer and Beauty & Impermanence.

John B. Calhoun, an American ethologist, became famous for his "Universe 25" experiment, where he created a utopian environment for mice with no predators and unlimited access to food and water.
The population, freed from material constraints, grew rapidly and soon serious social problems began to manifest themselves - aggression increased, social bonds broke down and reproduction declined. Calhoun used the term 'behavioural sink' to describe the behaviour of inflated populations and self-centred, passive individuals.

R.M.S. Titanic, the largest passenger ocean liner in the world at the time, represented the perfection and pride of the British Navy. During her maiden voyage, the Titanic struck an iceberg shortly before midnight on April 14-15, killing approximately 1,500 passengers and crew members. The Titanic's tragic fate has been the subject of numerous works of art, including the American film Titanic (1997, James Cameron), which won numerous awards, including a record 11 Academy Awards.

HENTAI (Czech transliteration, int. transliteration - hentai) - can be translated as naughty, sexual or perverted. It is used primarily by Western audiences as a general term for pornographic cartoon (manga) or animated (anime) material. The current form of hentai as hard-core pornography originated after World War II as an extreme version of mainstream manga, which became a popular and widely available entertainment in post-war Japan.