Talk

Seeing like a machine

Memo Akten

Date
Thursday 22 October
Time
11:20 – 12:00
Room
Grande Salle
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About

For close to two decades, Memo Akten has worked with artificial intelligence and machine learning systems, exploring new kinds of visual instruments for creative expression, creating artworks and performances that examine how we perceive and make sense of the world, and studying their inner workings and how they shape our behaviour, relationships and culture.
In this presentation, he takes us through works that probe the boundaries of perception and cognition, in which our two eyes fight over what is real, and the mathematics of machine learning algorithms themselves homogenize and erase individuality. The intimacy and vulnerability of human–machine relationships emerge in works that turn our confessions to Google into prayers, and stage live improvisations between a singer and her AI doppelganger. From the distributed cognition of octopuses to an ensemble of human drummers controlled by a machine, collectively performing a complex composition none of them is aware of, the talk explores hierarchies of agency and the distributed nature of intelligence.

Gallery

Photos: Hanna Radek

Speaker

Memo Akten

Memo Akten is an artist, researcher, and computer scientist working with emerging technologies both as creative medium and as subject of critical inquiry. He creates Speculative Simulations and Data Dramatizations that probe the cultural, social and ecological impacts of our contemporary techno-lifestyles, and the collisions between science and spirituality, modernity and ritual, self and collective intelligence. His practice spans moving image, sound, language, dance, installation and performance, often employing algorithmic, data-driven, and interactive processes. He holds a PhD in Artificial Intelligence and Computational Art from Goldsmiths, University of London, is Associate Professor at UC San Diego, and cofounder of the Superradiance Center for Entangled Intelligence and Planetary Consciousness. He has exhibited and performed internationally and received numerous awards including the Prix Ars Electronica Golden Nica.