by Lin Yi-Ning, Chiu Yi Jie, Lin Pei Chen

Our great war is a spiritual war. Our great depression is our lives. — Fight Club, 1999 Aren’t we like robots when being fed information day after day? Humans in 2021 not only need to face a survival crisis, but they also strive to confront the problems of everyday repetition, so-called “daily misfortune.” “Boredom” is a symbol of the ever-increasing development of human abilities. With a settled mode of life, people forgo migrating around physical space. Rather, they expand and complicate their own mental space, and engage in an endless battle against boredom. “Avoiding boredom” has become a vital issue for humans. People resort to shopping online in order to counter boredom, yet this only causes insomnia and cannot satisfy their withered souls. The 1999 classic film “Fight Club” uses the most violent conflicts to reveal modern people’s daily struggles. Twenty-two years after its release, the film still proves that “boredom” remains the source of a heavy burden in modern times.

The idea of resisting boredom through personal behavior permeates the mind of the whole world. Streaming platforms give these daily micro-resistances a stage on which to play. Rather than merely scrolling through countless exercises of boredom and self-amusement, we should reflect on our daily behaviors. We have the potential to mobilize our intellect to shop rationally, to enrich our hearts, and actively to break the cycle of boredom, then to fight for ourselves. The exhibition “Generation Bored Stiff” attempts to discuss the notions of “the misfortune of modern humans” by facing up to the human pursuit of “desire”, extending to the present day to interpret boredom and to provide the rules to live with it.

2021年的人類，不僅需要面對生存危機，更需要努力從個人行為對抗滲入全世界的「日常性不幸」。「無聊」這件事，是人類的能力日益高度發展的象徵。從定居生活模式的建立開始，定居者不再需要物理空間上的遷徙，因此將自己的心裡空間擴大複雜化，人類就此開啟與無聊永無止盡的戰鬥，而「迴避無聊」成為人類至關重要的課題。現代人網購各式各樣高貴的生活品，仍無法滿足日漸枯竭的心靈而導致失眠，在《鬥陣俱樂部（Fight Club）》中用最暴力的方式揭示現代人日復一日的生活，需要找到舒解壓力的出口，距今上映22年過去，無聊仍是沈重煩惱的種子。 串流影音平台給予日常微抵抗有發揮的舞台和宣洩的管道，當我們在翻閱「關於無聊的日常演練」，我們理應在獲得樂趣及感到無聊間反思: 日常得到消遣的行為，出擊打破無聊循環的人，以動員自己的潛力或理性的消費能力為信念，並充實自己的身心靈，為自己「搏鬥」。展覽《不幸福利社》希望透過正視人類對於「慾望」的追求，討論「現代人之不幸」的原因，延伸至時下詮釋無聊、並提供與之共處的生存法則。