The artwork was produced by a Swiss art collective called!Mediengruppe Bitnik, who reproduced Assange's room at the Ecuadorian Embassy down to the finest detail.
A treadmill, a dozen cell phones, several cups of tea, a copy of Sun Tzu's "The Art of War," the signature mask of the Anonymous group and dozens of folders with titles ranging from "Intelligence Iraq" to "Banking Blockade," are some of the items in the room.
Even the wi-fi signal, when connected, fools an electronic device into thinking it is in London, and brings up a Google Map of London.
En ce moment à la @gaitelyrique on peut découvrir la chambre de @JulianAssange_ et appeler des espions #lanceursdalerte pic.twitter.com/5Xe0B2OUho
— Laurent Bigarella (@iamlaurentb) 13 января 2017 г.
The aim of the exhibition is to enable visitors "to feel the contrast between the strict supervision within the walls of the Embassy, and the 20 square meters where the activities of WikiLeaks continue to be felt," the exhibition's curator Marie Lechner explained.
Rather than make "heroes" of whistleblowers, the artists want visitors to question what we think about "the reasons they exist in our society," and about their important role in disclosing methods of control or manipulation of data.
The Swiss art collective were able to reproduce the room thanks to their 2013 project "Delivery for Mr Assange," in which they posted a parcel addressed to Assange at the Ecuadorian embassy in London.
Dans la chambre de Julian Assange… @gaitelyrique #lanceursdalerte pic.twitter.com/ZOorPOzhGv
— Claire Fabre (@FabreClaire) 11 января 2017 г.
The parcel contained a camera which documented its journey through the Royal Mail postal system through a hole in the parcel. After 32 hours, with several thousand Twitter users following its progress, the parcel was delivered to the Ecuadorian embassy in London on January 17 2013, and was received in his room by Julian Assange a short time later.
Assange has spent over four years in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where he fled after Sweden sought to extradite him from the UK over allegations he committed rape there in 2010. Assange fears that if he is extradited to Sweden he will then be extradited to the US, where he would face a long prison term for leaking hundreds of thousands of secret US diplomatic cables.
