Exhibitions
Mythological Consultory: a contemporary oracle machine that transforms the question into a poetic experience
The new installation will travel to the 2026 Venice Biennale and will be incorporated into the future museum of the Lluís Coromina Foundation in Banyoles.
The MITO Collective has presented in Barcelona Consultori Mitològic , an interactive art installation that turns the act of asking into a symbolic and reflective experience. Curated by Álex Brahim and Giovanna Cicutto, the piece has been acquired by the Lluís Coromina Foundation and is shaping up to be one of the standout works of its future museum project , scheduled to open its doors in Banyoles in 2030.
The installation will soon travel to Venice, where it can be visited at the Hotel Monaco & Grand Canal within the framework of the Biennale of Art and the Film Festival, between May 8 and November 22, 2026. In this edition, the Biennale revolves around the theme "In a minor key" , focused on silenced voices and the whispers of the soul, a context that fits with the proposal of MITO.
An oracle between technology and myth
Mythological Consultorium is presented as a hybrid machine, halfway between a telephone booth and a time capsule. Its operation is apparently simple: the viewer asks a question and receives an answer in the form of a sentence, inspired by classical and contemporary myths.
Despite its interactive appearance, the installation does not really “listen” to the questions. As its creators explain, the machine is programmed with thousands of possible answers, designed to cover any existential question, except those related to health. This limitation reinforces its playful character and moves the piece away from a practical function to place it in the realm of reflection and irony.
The artists Enrique Baeza and Quim Bonastra, responsible for the project, thus propose a device that recovers the ancestral tradition of oracles, but filtered through contemporary sensitivity. The answer no longer comes from an absolute authority, but from an ambiguous, open and interpretative system.
Asking in times of noise
For one of the curators, Álex Brahim, the installation highlights a deeply current need: the constant search for answers in a world saturated with information. “We continue to need answers, even when the authority that issues them is ambiguous and subjective,” he notes, highlighting the role of poetry as a center of mental and spiritual experience.
In this sense, Consultori Mitològic proposes a pause within the accelerated rhythm of contemporary life. By turning the act of consulting —today automated and immediate— into a ritualized experience, the installation invites the public to stop, ask essential questions, and accept answers that are not always literal.
Between reflection and play
Beyond its technological and scenic component, the piece is proposed as a tool to reduce the environmental and mental noise of the present. Its creators define the project as a way of thinking through myth, an invitation to reconnect with symbolic narratives to interpret contemporary experience.
With this proposal, the MITO Collective places Consultori Mitològic on the border between art, philosophy and play, turning the question into the true center of the work and the answer into an open space of meaning.
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