A conversation between Sandra Gaudenzi (i-Docs), Sandra Tabares Duque (audiovisual producer), Francesca Panetta (MIT Center for Advanced Virtuality) and Halsey Burgund (sound artist) about their collaborative projects Corona Haikus and Corona Diaries. Joining the discussion will also be two active participants of the Corona Haikus project: Edith Sierra Montaño (director and new media consultant) and Valentine Goddard (AI ethics expert).
Sandra Gaudenzi
During the time of COVID-19 lockdown we have seen an explosion of social media and collaborative projects, aimed at making social isolation more bearable. Some were a way to reach out and feel connected, others to document unprecedented times. The thin line between the subject and the observer has never been so blurred… who is co-creating with whom, and who is in control of what?
Sandra Tabares Duque
In this conversation, the authors of two collaborative corona projects will be joined by participants to question together: What makes a project that asks for very personal sharing, work? What makes us choose to participate in one project rather than another? What pushes us to come back?
And ultimately: how is the potential gap between the author’s initial proposition and what is really received by the participants being negotiated and steered?
Adnan presented Algorithms, Ethics & Justice at the MAD conference. In order to lay the foundations for a discussion around the argument that the adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies benefits the powerful few, focussing on their own existential concerns, the paper will narrow down the analysis of the argument to social justice and jurisprudence (i.e. the philosophy of law), considering also the historical context. The paper explores the notion of humanised artificial intelligence in order to discuss potential challenges society might face in the future. The paper does not discuss current forms and applications of artificial intelligence, as, so far, there is no AI technology, which is self-conscious and self-aware, being able to deal with emotional and social intelligence. It is a discussion around AI as a speculative hypothetical entity. One could the ask, if such a speculative self-conscious hardware/software system were created at what point could one talk of personhood? And what criteria could there be in order to say an AI system was capable of committing AI crimes?The paper will discuss the construction of the legal system through the lens of political involvement of what one may want to consider to be powerful elites. Before discussing these aspects the paper will clarify the notion of “powerful elites”. In doing so the paper will be demonstrating that it is difficult to prove that the adoption of AI technologies is undertaken in a way which mainly serves a powerful class in society. Nevertheless, analysing the culture around AI technologies with regard to the nature of law with a philosophical and sociological focus enables one to demonstrate a utilitarian and authoritarian trend in the adoption of AI technologiesThe paper will then look, in a more detailed manner, into theories analysing the historical and social systematisation, or one may say disposition, of laws, and the impingement of neo-liberal tendencies upon the adoption of AI technologies. The regulatory, self-governing potential of AI algorithms and the justification by authority of the current adoption of AI technologies within civil society will be analysed next. The paper will propose an alternative, some might say practically unattainable, approach to the current legal system by looking into restorative justice for AI crimes, and how the ethics of care, through social contracts, could be applied to AI technologies. In conclusion the paper will discuss affect and humanised artificial intelligence with regards to the emotion of shame, when dealing with AI crimes.
Righting victim participation in transitional justice (Tine Destrooper)
How do societies seek to come to terms with legacies of large-scale abuses in order to ensure accountability, serve justice and achieve reconciliation? And what role can victims play in this process? These are crucial questions for scholars and practitioners of transitional justice (TJ). Approaches to TJ are varied. Yet generally four pillars are emphasised: (criminal)justice, truth-seeking, reparations, and guarantees of non-recurrence. TJ practitioners and scholars alike have increasingly been turning to victim-centric,participatory approaches to increase the legitimacy and “efficacy” of TJ processes. By giving victims centre stage, stakeholders hope to better address victims’ needs,enhance local ownership and transform victims into agents of change who can carry forth processes of justice seeking after international actors leave.But what do we really know about how to best organize this victim participation, or what its long-term effects are?
This project studies the long-term and unforeseen effects of victim participation in transitional justice processes. It takes the cases of Tunisia, Guatemala, the DRC and Cambodia to map current and best practices, and to make recommendations for more victim-sensitive approaches to transitional justice. Principal Investigator: Prof. Dr. Tine Destrooper Researchers: Safa Belghith, Christian Cirhigiri, Elke Evrard, Brigitte Herremans (see also proposal of Brigitte related to arts/literature and displaced people), Gretel Mejía, Sangeetha Yogendran
Countering erasure (Brigitte Herremans)
Countering erasure: can the arts contribute to restoring justice in Syria?’ This project explores how artistic expressions can help to restore justice in situations of unabated violence where transitional justice (TJ) initiatives are being implemented. The main question is to what extent artistic practices, and literature in particular, can contribute to TJ efforts and counter the narrative silencing of victims.Syria is taken as a case study to examine this question. As the Syrian conflict is ongoing, there is no fully-fledged formal TJ process. Nevertheless, Syrian local activists and international actors are testing certain elements of the TJ toolkit on the ground, such as the documentation of violations of international law and criminal justice.Brigitte will tentatively argue that there is scope to strengthen the current TJ efforts in Syria. The implementation of TJ initiatives might need to be reconsidered in order to guarantee victims’ right to truth and justice, and better assimilate their voices in justice processes. One approach for doing so, is by looking at the ways in which artistic practices can play a role in the development of complementary and innovative avenues toward justice for Syrians beyond trials. She foregrounds artistic practices based on the hypothesis that they can help to rethink some of the existing TJ architecture by understanding and utilizing the evidence differently, including through truth-seeking initiatives, feeding the transitional imagination in ways that are more representative of the experiences of victims, in order to avoid erasure.
Privatised Push-Back of the Nivin (Charles Heller)
This report is an investigation into the Nivin case and new pattern of privatised push-back practice. In November 2018, five months after Matteo Salvini was made Italy’s Interior Minister, and began to close the country’s ports to rescued migrants, a group of 93 migrants was forcefully returned to Libya after they were ‘rescued’ by the Nivin, a merchant ship flying the Panamanian flag, in violation of their rights, and in breach of international refugee law. The migrants’ boat was first sighted in the Libyan Search and Rescue (SAR) Zone by a Spanish surveillance aircraft, part of Operation EUNAVFOR MED – Sophia, the EU’s anti-smuggling mission. The EUNAVFOR MED – Sophia Command passed information to the Italian and Libyan Coast Guards to facilitate the interception and ‘pull-back’ of the vessel to Libya. However, as the Libyan Coast Guard (LYCG) patrol vessels were unable to perform this task, the Italian Coast Guard (ICG) directly contacted the nearby Nivin ‘on behalf of the Libyan Coast Guard’, and tasked it with rescue. LYCG later assumed coordination of the operation, communicating from an Italian Navy ship moored in Tripoli, and, after the Nivin performed the rescue, directed it towards Libya. While the passengers were initially told they would be brought to Italy, when they realised they were being returned to Libya, they locked themselves in the hold of the ship.A standoff ensured in the port of Misrata which lasted ten days, until the captured passengers were violently removed from the vessel by Libyan security forces, detained, and subjected to multiple forms of ill-treatment, including torture.This case exemplifies a recurrent practice that we refer to as ‘privatised push-back’. This new strategy has been implemented by Italy, in collaboration with the LYCG, since mid-2018, as a new modality of delegated rescue, intended to enforce border control and contain the movement of migrants from the Global South seeking to reach Europe.
Digitalisation of Labour and Migration (Manuela Bojadžijev)
Digital technologies are transforming the world of work and have far-reaching consequences for mobility and migration. This project studies the reorganisation of labour through digital platforms, and it looks at how digital conditions are also simultaneously changing the forms, practices and our conceptions of labour migration.
Spheres: Journal for Digital Cultures, an open access and peer-reviewed web (Clemens Apprich)
We are witnessing an acceleration of the deployment of digital technologies in border regimes as well as in migratory practices. This does not necessarily make borders ‘smarter’, but it points to spiraling dynamics between border and migration practices to which digital technologies prove central. Technologies deployed by European countries to manage the so-called ‘refugee crisis’ – from fences to the Eurosur drone system – have their reverse side. While digital networks facilitate surveillance systems, they also foster mobility and challenge border regimes at the same time. Persisting migration in defiance of ever more sophisticated border technologies demonstrate the possible detour of control systems. In our fourth issue of spheres, we investigate the significance of digital technologies for migration and the relation between migratory regimes and practices on the one hand, and digital cultures and infrastructures on the other.As an online journal, spheres operates on the premise that already published issues are kept open for new content. Hence, the goal of the workshop is to discuss and develop ideas for further contributions.
Joana Moll will host a critical exploration through the world of data marketplaces and the economic role of profile pics from dating websites. Participants will get a glimpse into the hidden mechanics of selling and buying private images and data without the users’ knowledge. They will further be drawn into the invisible circulation of images as currency and get rare insight into the role of data brokers and transactions.
Critical thinkers, artists, researchers, activists, and geeks in search of other economies and financial discourses for a fair society.
All along, these have been dark times for the economy, as offshore finance wreaks havoc in the very fabric of cities and communities, and crypto-companies navigate the world in search of their own tax havens. Information leaks from financial paradises have made it clear that the wealthy, influential, and well-connected will still escape taxation. These are the same people turning places like Malta and the Bahamas into luxury apartment zones. At the same time, well-documented Dutch fiscal loopholes cost the world approximately 22 billion euros in lost taxes each year. Corporations like Shell tempt governments with scraps of their ill-gained revenues in exchange for legal residence in anonymous letterboxes. Global business and crypto-speculation have debased national regulations to the competitive logics of an international tax marketplace, and local economies and communities struggle to hold up against privatisation and the mass transformation of jobs to a precarious freelance existence in the gig economy.
Weeks into the corona crisis, it is too early to say which aspects of the global financial system have been thrown into the dustbin of history. Pivotal nation-states are now exploring digital currencies as one tool for post-pandemic stimulus (or austerity). How do the earlier proposals for Universal Basic Income relate to the sudden appearance of helicopter money in some countries? Are the Keynesian money proposals to prop up the Western economies an indication of the end of the neoliberal hegemony? Is the ban on cash during the corona crisis an indication of the arrival of the cashless society?
It is a grim scenario, but perhaps not all is lost. The economy is not – and never was – merely in the hands of faceless corporations and cryptocurrency speculators. MoneyLab explores the imaginaries of artists, researchers, activists, and geeks in search of other possible economies and urgently interrogates a different financial discourse. It has always asked: can we use technology critically to support alternative values of cooperation and “commoning” in a world that is dominated by individualism and competition?
MoneyLab #8, the first-ever in a post-socialist country and the first-ever virtual edition, features examples far from the mainstream media spotlight. It zooms in on the effects of offshore finance and explores counter-experiments in the realms of housing, care work, and blockchain technology. In the fringes, something interesting is happening: blockchain is no longer just another tool for capitalist growth obsessions, and people are realising radical visions for fairly-waged care work, redistributed wealth, equitable social relations, and strong grassroots communities. In our world of vanishing cash, corner-cutting multinationals, and weakened social support structures, can community currencies or self-organised care networks strengthen neighbourhoods? What would fair and social housing look like if it was turned into the cornerstone of the economy? Who is building local systems that can stand up against the financialisation of housing in the global platform economy?
MoneyLab #8 sheds light on radical and alternative strategies for self-organisation and pushes on towards new and collective futures situated in resilient local communities.
Zoomed In is a new virtual festival celebrating photography and architecture.
The festival will take part from 21st-24th April 2020, and is one of the official partners of the Dezeen Virtual Design Festival.
Zoomed In is organised by London-based architectural photographer Luke O’Donovan, kindly supported by an incredibly generous network of guest curators and event participants. Please direct any enquiries to Luke at contact@lukeodonovan.co.uk
For updates on the festival, please check our Instagram, Twitter, and Youtube. You can also subscribe to Luke’s email newsletter below for updates on Zoomed In and other architectural photography projects.
Can a conference be a machine for thinking through new ideas in a collectivity or from a multiplicity of perspectives? Since the question of artistic research in Africa is new and evolving, we have structured the conference to operate as an open-ended interrogative machine. This conference incorporates a wide variety of inputs, from traditional conference paper presentations and panels, to performances, interactive engagements and workshops.We have also been as inclusive as possible, treating postgraduate student work as having the same potential as the work of established figures in the field. All the work selected for this conference was chosen because of the vigour and freshness of the ideas expressed in the proposals, and the potential for the work to open up new ways of thinking about artistic practice and research in Africa in the 21st century.We have designed the conference to foreground the asking of questions, as well as sharing ideas and critique through recognising that artistic research, with its emphasis on embodied knowledge and new forms of subjectivity represents multiple challenges for traditional academic hierarchies. In programming of this conference, we have almost as many “performance-lectures” as we have traditional academic papers. More than one group of presenters have chosen to further question the format of the conference, with anti-panels; while others offer interactive workshops on indeterminism, decolonisation of the mind, and the potential of digital networked media to link embodied performances across the continent.With over sixty presenters, this promises to be a very exciting conference which will articulate the questions that need to be taken forward into the development of artistic research in Africa.
Adnan Hadzi presents thoughts on ‘mindless futurism’ at the Hacking the Computable symposium.
Zur ästhetischen Kritik digitaler Rationalität
Eine Tagung der Staatlichen Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst Stuttgart/Campus Gegenwart, der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Ästhetik und dem Forum Digitalisierung der Gesellschaft für Medienwissenschaft in Kooperation mit der Zürcher Hochschule der Künste, der Staatlichen Akademie der bildenden Künste Stuttgart und der Université de Fribourg.
Tatsächlich scheinen mit der digitalen Wende, dem ‘digital disrupture’ sämtliche gesellschaftliche und auch kulturellen Prozesse in ein dichtes Netz von Codierungen und Kontrollen eingesponnen, die ebenfalls die Dinge (die ‚smart‘ werden) als auch die Körper und ihre Identität und Integrität wie das Ästhetische selbst und die Künste betreffen. Digitalisierung und Algorithmisierung tangieren im Sinne entscheidungslogischer Programmarchitekturen mittels Artificial Intelligence, Deep Learning, stochastischer Zufallsprozesse Denken und Kreativität als vermeintlich letzte Domänen eines ,Anderen’ der Computation und genuines Residuum der conditio humana.Die Vermutung liegt nahe, dass diese ‚letzten‘ Entscheidungen über den Ort des „Menschlichen“ sowie das, was die Rolle von Ethik und Verantwortlichkeit wie gleichermaßen der kritischen Urteilskraft sein kann, auf dem Feld des Ästhetischen ausgetragen werden – ob als spezifisch ästhetische Anmutung des Technischen und Ökonomischen oder in künstlerischen Formen von Erkenntnis und Kritik. Hier geht es um Möglichkeiten einer Widerständigkeit gegenüber der vermeintlich restlosen Usurpation des Realen durch Algorithmik und Digitalisierung. Die Tagung Hacking the Computable. Zur ästhetischen Kritik digitaler Rationalität versteht sich in erster Linie als Diskussionsplattform, die diese und ähnliche Fragen zu untersuchen, kritisch zu hinterfragen und – möglichst kontrovers – zu überprüfen sucht.Veranstalter*innen: Judith Siegmund, Natascha Adamowsky, Dieter Mersch, Emmanuel Alloa, Daniel Feige
