News from the Collective

This series listens to the political, gendered, queer(ed), racial engagements and class entanglements involved in proclaiming out loud: La-TIN-x. ChI-ca-NA. La-TI-ne. ChI-ca-n-@.  Xi-can-x. Funded by an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation as part of the Crossing Latinidades Humanities Research Initiative, the Latinx Sound Cultures Studies Working Group critically considers the role of sound and listening in our formation as political subjects. Through both a comparative and cross-regional lens, we invite Latinx Sound Scholars to join us as we dialogue about our place within the larger fields of Chicanx/Latinx Studies and Sound Studies. We are delighted to publish our initial musings with Sounding Out!, a forum that has long prioritized sound from a queered, racial, working-class and  “always-from-below” epistemological standpoint. —Ed. Dolores Inés Casillas

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Busco la colaboración universal donde todos los Benitos puedan llegar a ser Bad Bunny. –FlowGPT, TikTok

In November of 2023, the reggaetón song “DEMO #5: NostalgIA” went viral on various digital platforms, particularly TikTok. The track, posted by user FlowGPT, makes use of artificial intelligence (Inteligencia Artificial) to imitate the voices of Justin Bieber, Bad Bunny, and Daddy Yankee. The song begins with a melody reminiscent of Justin Bieber’s 2015 pop hit “Sorry.” Soon, reggaetón’s characteristic boom-ch-boom-chick drumbeat drops, and the voices of the three artists come together to form a carefully crafted, unprecedented crossover.

Bad Bunny’s catchy verse “sal que te paso a buscar” quickly inundated TikTok feeds as users began to post videos of themselves dancing or lip-syncing to the song.  The song was not only very good but it also successfully replicated these artists– their voices, their style, their vibe. Soon, the song exited the bounds of the digital and began to be played in clubs across Latin America, marking a thought-provoking novelty in the usual repertoire of reggaetón hits.  In line with the current anxieties around generative AI, the song quickly generated public controversy. Only a few weeks after its release, ‘nostalgIA’ was taken down from most digital platforms.

The mind behind FlowGPT is Chilean producer Maury Senpai, who in a series of TikTok responses explained his mission of creative democratization in a genre that has been historically exclusive of certain creators. In one video, FlowGPT encourages listeners to contemplate the potential of this “algorithm” to allow songs by lesser-known artists and producers to reach the ears of many listeners, by replicating the voices of well-known singers. Maury Senpai’s production process involved lyric writing, extensive study of the singers’ vocals, and the Kits.ai tool.

Therefore, contrary to FlowGPT’s robotic brand, ‘nostalgIA’ was the product of careful collaboration between human and machine– or, what Ross Cole calls “cyborg creativity.”  This hybridization enmeshes the artist and the listener, allowing diverse creators their creative desires. Cyborg creativity, of course, is not an inherent result of GenAI’s advent. Instead, I argue that reggaetón has long been embedded in a tradition of musical imitation and a deep reliance on technological tools, which in turn challenges popular concerns about machine-human artistic collaboration.

Many creators worry that GenAI will co-opt a practice that for a long time has been regarded as strictly human. GenAI’s reliance on pre-existing data threatens to hide the labor of artists who contributed to the model’s output. We may also add the inherent biases present in training data. Pasquinelli and Joler propose that the question “Can AI be creative?” be reformulated as “Is machine learning able to create works that are not imitations of the past?” Machine learning models detect patterns and styles in training data and then generate “random improvisation” within this data. Therefore, GenAI tools are not autonomous creative actors but often operate with generous human intervention that trains, monitors, and disseminates the products of these models.

The inability to define GenAI tools as inherently creative on their own does not mean they can’t be valuable for artists seeking to experiment in their work. Hearkening back to Donna Haraway’s concept of the cyborg, Ross Cole argues that

Such [AI] music is in fact a species of hybrid creativity predicated on the enmeshing of people and computers (…) We might, then, begin to see AI not as a threat to subjective expression, but another facet of music’s inherent sociality.

Many authors agree that unoriginal content—works that are essentially reshufflings of existing material—cannot be considered legitimate art. However, an examination of the history of the reggaetón genre invites us to question this idea. In “From Música Negra to Reggaetón Latino,” Wayne Marshall explains how the genre emerged from simultaneous and mutually-reinforcing processes in Panamá, Puerto Rico, and New York, where artists brought together elements of dancehall, reggae, and American hip hop. Towards the turn of the millennium, the genre’s incorporation of diverse musical elements and the availability of digital tools for production favored its commercialization across Latin America and the United States. 

The imitation of previous artists has been embedded in the fabric of reggaetón from a very early stage. Some of the earliest examples of reggaetón were in fact Spanish lyrics placed over Jamaican dancehall riddims— instrumental tracks with characteristic melodies. When Spanish-speaking artists began to draw from dancehall, they used these same riddims in their songs, and continue to do so today. A notable example of this pattern is the Bam Bam riddim, which is famously used in the song “Murder She Wrote” by Chaka Demus & Pliers (1992).

This riddim made its way into several reggaetón hits, such as “El Taxi” by Osmani García, Pitbull, and Sensato (2015).

We may also observe reggaetón’s tradition of imitation in frequent references to “old school” artists by the “new school,” through beat sampling, remixes, and features. We see this in Karol G’s recent hit “GATÚBELA,” where she collaborates with Maldy, former member of the iconic Plan B duo.

Reggaetón’s deeply rooted tradition of “tribute-paying” also ties into its differentiation from other genres. As the genre grew in commercial value, perhaps to avoid copyright issues, producers cut down on their direct references to dancehall and instead favored synthesized backings. Marshall quotes DJ El Niño in saying that around the mid-90s, people began to use the term reggaetón to refer to “original beats” that did not solely rely on riddims but also employed synthesizer and sequencer software. In particular, the program Fruity Loops, initially launched in 1997, with “preset” sounds and effects provided producers with a wider set of possibilities for sonic innovation in the genre.

The influence of technology on music does not stop at its production but also seeps into its socialization. Today, listeners increasingly engage with music through AI-generated content. Ironically, following the release of Bad Bunny’s latest album, listeners expressed their discontent through AI-generated memes of his voice. One of the most viral ones consisted of Bad Bunny’s voice singing “en el McDonald’s no venden donas.”

The clip, originally sung by user Don Pollo, was modified using AI to sound like Bad Bunny, and then combined with reggaetón beats and the Bam Bam riddim. Many users referred to this sound as a representation of the light-heartedness they saw lacking in the artist’s new album. While Un Verano Sin Ti (2022) stood out as an upbeat summer album that addressed social issues such as U.S. imperialism and machismo, Nadie Sabe lo que va a Pasar Mañana (2023) consisted mostly of tiraderas or disses against other artists and left some listeners disappointed. In a 2018 post for SO!, Michael S. O’Brien speaks of this sonic meme phenomenon, where a sound and its repetition come to encapsulate collective discontent.

Another notorious case of AI-generated covers targets recent phenomenon Young Miko. As one of the first openly queer artists to break into the urban Latin mainstream, Young Miko filled a long-standing gap in the genre—the need for lyrics sung by a woman to another woman. Her distinctive voice has also been used in viral AI covers of songs such as “La Jeepeta,” and “LALA,” originally sung by male artists. To map Young Miko’s voice over reggaetón songs that advance hypermasculinity– through either a love for Jeeps or not-so-subtle oral sex– represents a creative reclamation of desire where the agent is no longer a man, but a woman. Jay Jolles writes of TikTok’s modifications to music production, namely the prioritization of viral success. The case of AI-generated reggaetón covers demonstrates how catchy reinterpretations of an artist’s work can offer listeners a chance to influence the music they enjoy, allowing them to shape it to their own tastes.

Examining the history of musical imitation and digital innovation in reggaetón expands the bounds of artistry as defined by GenAI theorists. In the conventions of the TikTok platform, listeners have found a way to participate in the artistry of imitation that has long defined the genre. The case of FlowGPT, along with the overwhelmingly positive reception of “nostalgIA,” point towards a future where the boundaries between the listener and the artist are blurred, and where technology and digital spaces are the platforms that allow for an enhanced cyborg creativity to take place.

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Featured Image: Screenshot from ““en el McDonald’s no venden donas.” Taken by SO!

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Laurisa Sastoque is a Colombian scholar of digital humanities, history, and storytelling. She works as a Digital Preservation Training Officer at the University of Southampton, where she collaborates with the Digital Humanities Team to promote best practices in digital preservation across Galleries/Gardens, Libraries, Archives, and Museums (GLAM), and other sectors. She completed an MPhil in Digital Humanities from the University of Cambridge as a Gates Cambridge scholar. She holds a B.A. in History, Creative Writing, and Data Science (Minor) from Northwestern University.

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REWIND!…If you liked this post, you may also dig: 

Boom! Boom! Boom!: Banda, Dissident Vibrations, and Sonic Gentrification in Mazatlán—Kristie Valdez-Guillen

Listening to MAGA Politics within US/Mexico’s Lucha Libre –Esther Díaz Martín and Rebeca Rivas

Ronca Realness: Voices that Sound the Sucia Body—Cloe Gentile Reyes 

Echoes in Transit: Loudly Waiting at the Paso del Norte Border Region—José Manuel Flores & Dolores Inés Casillas

Experiments in Agent-based Sonic Composition—Andreas Pape

From the 4th to the 9th of October, 2024, ISSA (Island School of Social Autonomy) facilitated a collective building action and series of lectures, workshops, and discussions in Vis, guided by the central theme of To Live Together. The aim was to build new ways of “being, living, and learning together beyond the ruins of capitalism” and provide an embodied “platform for contemplating a different world.”

The essay was originally published in Makery.info on November 13, 2024, as part of the Rewilding Cultures series – a cooperation program co-funded by the European Union.

A community has been brewing on the island of Vis, one of the most distant islands in the Adriatic Sea off the coast of southern Croatia. The Island School of Social Autonomy or ISSA, located above the village of Komiža on the western part of the island, is a recently formed organism. Spearheaded by the Croatian philosopher Srećko Horvat, it is a sprawling community of mostly Balkan artists and activists who collectively bought and are working on restoring three hectares of desolate land and previously uninhabited mountainous green terrain. ISSA is an old stone house, a small construction site, a group of friends, an extended community, and a network.

Before I attended the ISSA To Live Together conference, I was talking with a few friends about going. Some of them knew about it because of the involvement of the Italian philosopher, Franco Bifo Berardi. Some knew about it through the grapevine, and some knew about it because Pamela Anderson is listed as a donor on the website. One acquaintance laughed and said; “The School of Social Autonomy? Isn’t that a bit of an oxymoron?” Later on the ferry ride, as I watched the sun dip into the sea and felt the mainland retreating behind my back, his question stuck in my head.

Credit: Matteo Principi

The school in the name of Island School of Social Autotnomy is not glided over, nor is it a stand-in word to represent the conference-type structure of the program. It is an integral part of ISSA’s ideological positioning inspired by Ivan Illich’s book Deschooling Society (1971) and his claim that the contemporary educational system has turned into an “advertising agency that makes you believe that you need the society as it is”. The notion of social autonomy is not divorced from the notion of pedagogy, and learning with and from each other. According to Paulo Freires Pedagogy of the Oppressed, one of the inspirations of ISSA, the learner is to be treated as a co-creator of knowledge. Many of the lecturers at the ‘conference’ are members of the ISSA organism, or have started their own similar, perhaps more private initiatives such as James Bridle, a British artist and writer who is based on an island in the Aegean Sea. The search for autonomy as a political strategy and a model for social organization is a recurring idea at ISSA. It is closely linked with the nature of islands as isolated and hermetic spaces, spaces where people inscribe their desires and grow them patiently, in the process integrating with the existing topology. ISSA’s location is thus both a geographic and metaphorical stance: “We believe that the future lies in archipelagos of autonomy.”

The idea of self-management as a framework has been consistently present in the history of island schools nurturing subversive discourse and activity. ISSA in its current form gives a nod of respect to the summer school of Korčula, founded in the 1960s on a nearby island in the former federal state of Yugoslavia. The historic summer school and the journal it birthed, Praxis, a Marxist-humanist journal, was commemorated in the panel talk entitled The 60th Anniversary of Praxis, and included Nadežda Čačinovič, Boris Buden, Ankica Čakardić, and Mira Oklobdžija all of whom were directly involved in the Korčula summer school. The Korčula summer school encounters that took place during the 1960s were crucial meeting

The 60th Anniversary of Praxis. CC 4.0 by ISSA School / BONK productions

As Boris Buden put it: “Dealing with the past makes sense only in the ability of us to take the past in our hands and affect the present.” The cultural heritage of Praxis proposed that these particular isolated spaces dedicated to critical thought towards existing infrastructures of property and social relations as well as simple collective leisure, took shape in ‘Dyonisian Socialism.’ Praxis and the Korčula summer school were informed by the idea that thinking must transcend the scope of academic institutions and nurture the singularity of multitudes rather than promoting a single monolithic school of thought: not a global revolution but many small local utopias. The ritual of meeting on the beaches in the late afternoon and drinking and talking was an important part of the Korčula summer school and was continued at ISSA, where initiatives such as Memory of the World, Chto Delat, Forest University, and Aventura presented their practices during the school on the beach sessions. Most of the two hundred participants that attended the current and second iteration of ISSA were activists, journalists, artists, and researchers working on parallel and often interlinked initiatives spanning multiple continents. Casual conversation merged with political critique and speculation ebbed and flowed with the waves.

Although it was not specifically mentioned, I couldn’t help but return to the concept of the archipelago and Edouard Glissant’s theory of archipelagic thinking. The theory of archipelagic thinking originates from the violently colonized scattering of islands in the Carribean, and the dissident philosophical thinking produced there, an arguably different context than the briefly colonized island of Vis that retained its language. Nevertheless, there are similarities in archipelagic thinking, marked by unpredictability, multiplicity-in-oneness, and ambiguity. It calls for an “insurrection of the imaginary faculties” aspiring towards innovative ways of conceiving the world, and resonates in many of the conversations echoing across ISSA and the Praxis journal before it.

Mira Oklobdžija, a panelist in the Praxis discussion, referred to a philosopher who had also reflected from the shores of an island: Aristotle and his definition of three forms of knowledge — theoria, poiesis, and praxis. She outlined some interesting digressions in the two generations of the Croatian summer schools, pointing out that ISSA is more activistic and anchored in praxis than the journal Praxis ever aspired to be. An audience member quipped that perhaps in ISSA, the poetry is precisely in the praxis, and this rings true to the guiding motto of ISSA; “We build the school, and the school builds us.”

Two days of ISSA were dedicated to restoring and expanding the old stone building or school nestled in the Vis hills, which will constitute the main hub of ISSA activities. During the days of To Live Together, the regular working force (usually just a few people) at the construction site swelled to a hundred or more, and work that normally took months was accomplished in two days. We carried wooden planks up the mountain and sanded them to construct the large terrace, and participated in a workshop on how to build traditional, terraced stone walls, a practice called dry stonewalling. This technique is so essential on the islands of the Adriatic that it has been included as an UNESCO intangible heritage of mankind. The workshop was led by Igor Mataić, a doctor of science specializing in geotechnics and environmental engineering who is also part of the Pomalo association, a cultural and action-based initiatives NGO on Vis dedicated to protecting the natural environment and sustainable life on the island. We learned where to place the larger anchoring boulders and how to fill in the gaps with smaller stones, making a type of wedge in the sloped side of the hill. The technique doesn’t need any adhesive or cement but relies on viney vegetation to slowly grow in the gaps of the larger stones, through the earth and pebbles, and hold the wall in place over time.

The incline of the mountain is consistently incorporated into the sustainable design of the school. The circular water system (as a convivial tool) demonstrated various ways of water circulation and collection. We were introduced to the construction of a large sloped surface of layered flat stones behind the house, dedicated to collecting and filtering accumulated rainwater. There is an adjacent fog collector project that catches mist and helps it to liquefy, dripping down into basins at the bottom of the fence-like structure.

CC 4.0 by ISSA School / BONK productions

At some point in the day, we saw a line of people walking up the mountain in single file, the first in the line carrying a large pole with a Wifi antenna at its top, looking for a good position to catch the available wifi and route it down to the house. It looked like a religious march in search of connection. Autonomy and self-management do not mean isolation. This initiative was the responsibility of !Mediengruppe Bitnik, an artist duo, and two core members of the ISSA collective who anchor the islands initiative as a practice of embodied tactical media. The co-founders of the Berlin-based collective originate from Vis and Zurich, and deal with reinterpreting urban technological systems that are not meant to be interacted with, utilizing “deliberate loss of control as a means to question established structures.” “When did we agree to these systems layered on top of society?” they asked in their lecture later in the week, describing their impressive opus of playful interferences. They rendered glitched photographs of urban architectural elements into the original stone structures and infiltrated the Zurich opera with phones that randomly dial citizens and transmit usually inaccessible audio, entangling interference with translation. In the spirit of tactical media, they not only initiated the Wifi antenna but also led a workshop titled Your Own Private Pirate Radio Station teaching participants how to assemble a predesigned FM transmitter circuit board to be used as a tactical tool, an artistic device, and a medium of communication. Participants constructed their own pirate radio stations, and, while edging around the law, achieved communicatation in a relatively local but useful radius.

The workshop For a Global Mutiny Against an Empire of Negligence led by the Pirate Care collective, resonated theoretically both with the act of making private radio stations and with the core principles of ISSA. Pirate Care is a research project and a network of activists, scholars, and practitioners who stand against the criminalization of solidarity. Pirate Care was introduced as a concept inspired by the hybrid figure of the pirate in his/her/their militant glory and autonomy, and the invisibility of the renegade figure of revolt. The pirate carer aims to address unequally distributed care, thus breaking empirical strongholds by repositioning knowledge production. In this sense, care is conceptualized as a militant and direct action practice and a partisan terrain of struggle. The concept of pirate care is grounded in its defining elements of breaking the law and claiming disobedience, critical usage of technology, communing private property and partisan knowledge and learning, queering kinship, and federating practices. Ultimately, pirate care unites anarchist legacies by aligning the vocabularies of diverse movements (such as Marxist & Eco Feminist) and federating fragmented pirate care initiatives. The wish to align vocabularies recalls the Praxis panel talk in which the concept of self-management was repositioned as an essentially anarchist framework rather than a communist legacy, thus interrogating the ownership of definitions.

For a Global Mutiny Against an Empire of Negligence. CC 4.0 by ISSA School / BONK productions

The idea of a federation is deeply important for the pirate carers and a concept that is too often forgotten in our leftist spaces. The pirate carers cultivate a profound suspicion towards positions of morality that frequently digress into judgment. Perhaps that is why, as a participant stated later in the day, contemporary political spaces are filled with “leftists who are looking for a political home where there is none”.  Thus the Pirate Care Collective works with other people’s practices of care, even though they do not necessarily agree with their politics, consequently federating common struggles and unions. This type of activation is essential as a subversion of the often unnoticed “elite capture” and co-option of renegade academic discourse and trickle-down activism. Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò, in his recent book Elite Capture: How the Powerful Took Over Identity Politics (And Everything Else), states that elite capture is what “stands between us and a transformative, nonsectarian, coalitional politics.” Federating, allyship, and a possible political home for the future left represent a strong undercurrent of thought accompanying the wide breadth of activities at ISSA.

The Pirate Care Collective facilitated a playful and simultaneously dystopic workshop. We were presented with the scenario of being stuck on the island because the mainland had suffered an acute breakdown of infrastructure and civil society. We were then divided into groups and challenged to take roles based on our capabilities of care and assistance. What would we do first? Who does what? Who and what should we take care of? A challenging exercise as you can imagine since it is always the case in such settings that there is an under-representation of engineers, doctors, and herbalists, and an overrepresentation of writers and painters. Nevertheless, throughout the exercise, we realized that skills that are not always valued, such as cooking and emotional perseverance, are essential in small utopias. What will always be needed is clear and calm communication, humor, and (pirate) care, all skills that we expanded during the ISSA conference.

James Bridle, artist and technologist who moved to an island in the Aegean, spoke of his experiments with fog collectors and water purifiers during his lecture and his delight that the ISSA team was developing the same knowledge. Bridle was playful, speaking about the interconnectivity of the world on a metaphysical and organic level rather than an infrastructural and extractivist level. He talked about the hearing of plants and the dancing of bees as active sensory participants in the world and described the solar community of which he is a member on the island where he lives. A solar community provides access to energy for member households through an autonomous solar grid, literally and metaphorically redistributing power through self-management.  Power communities are increasingly common, yet remain especially important to islands that are at bigger risk of being isolated from the main power grids of the mainland. “What was considered the periphery is actually the future,” explained James. The peripheries of the islands are places to prototype and experiment both because they are experiencing the climate conditions of the future and because of the archipelagic poesis ingrained in their seclusion and immersion.

Silvia Federici, an Italian feminist, activist, and writer, addressed us by Zoom in the beautiful, sculpted stone movie theatre in Komiža. She said we must work on “rebuilding the commons and inventing new ways of being together. Crucial as a form of self-defense is expanding our imagination — the new world will not burst out of our head like Minerva from the head of Zeus. It will follow a period of experimentation, breaking with the isolation of the individualization of society, where we don’t confront capitalism alone. We do it in our everyday life by changing how we reproduce life and ourselves.” The ISSA School of Social Autonomy attempts just that, by experimenting and weaving ancestral knowledge with a multiplicity of contemporary and historic schools of thought leaving us all with a profound sense of community, excitement, and hope. When I returned to the depressing and apathetic private conversations of everyday urban life in a capital city on the mainland, I encouraged my friends to join us on the island of the future, where the effects of building and learning together are collective, invigorating and visceral.

Credit: Matteo Principi

Theory on Demand #53

Localizing Design Studies: Perspectives on Turkey

Edited by Deniz Hasirci, Tuba Doğu, Deniz Avci, Gozde Damla Turhan-Haskara, Aybüke Taşer

Contributors: Deniz Hasirci, Deniz Avci, Tuba Doğu, Gözde Damla Turhan-Haskara, Filiz Özbengi Uslu, Elif Karakuş, Selen Çiçek, Mine Özkar, Hande Yıldız Çekindir, Gökçe Çağatay, Tuba Doğu, Anıl Dinç Demirbilek, Canberk Yurt, Sölen Kipöz, Özgül Kılınçarslan, Osman Demirbaş

Localizing Design Studies: Perspectives on Turkey includes research that ranges from case/field implementation ideas to quantitative/scientific data surveys to social, theoretical, and historical studies from all subfields of design to address the countless parallel and overlapping realities of design in the post-pandemic era. The post-covid period and unprecedented earthquakes in Turkey have made us question the role of design in our everyday lives, while the advent of dynamic technologies in design has made us reconsider the design realities that surround us. Quality research showcases the state of graduate work in the various fields of design studies.

Since the early 2000s studies in design and design history in Turkey have been developing an
increasingly strong profile. This visibility has been evidenced by the growing number of related
international conferences, innovative research initiatives and book and journal publications. All of these have been sustained by a significant platform of innovative doctoral research which has in turn been informed by a wide and diverse range of contemporary theoretical and historical approaches. This edited book provides valuable insights to the complexities of design and its impacts from a variety of recent Turkish perspectives as articulated by a new generation of Turkish scholars.

— Professor Emeritus Jonathan M Woodham, Associate, Centre for Design History,
University of Brighton, UK

Since its inception nearly two decades ago, the design studies course has championed research
fostering critical thinking and examining the ever-evolving dimensions of design. This includes
diverse methodologies, from practical applications and empirical studies to theoretical and historical analyses. In a world increasingly fragile due to shifting political dynamics, environmental crises, ongoing conflicts and wars, the urgency for innovative design responses has grown. Turkey’s devastating 2023 earthquake and global challenges like pandemics demand adaptive solutions, integrating technological advancements such as AI, blockchain, and the metaverse while redefining the designer’s role. This book explores these pressing themes, offering a journey into uncharted territories where resilience, serendipity, and innovation intersect.

— Professor Tevfik Balcıoğlu

Links to the pdf, epub and the Lulu page to order a paper copy can be found HERE

12 Dec 2024 18:00 – 20:00, Framer Framed, Oranje-Vrijstaatkade 71, Amsterdam

On 12 December 2024 at Framer Framed, System of Systems launches the first two books in their Managing Displacement series: Outsourcing and Extraction. System of Systems is a research project that analyses the bureaucratic, spatial, and technological conditions shaping Europe’s migration landscape.

The themes of each edition will be discussed by three contributors: critical media scholar Ariana Dongus, spatial and visual researcher Stefanos Levidis, and lecturer Hassan Ould Moctar, and is followed by a Q&A.

Ariana Dongus is a critical media scholar. She researches refugees, migration, and technology, focusing on AI’s social aspects, digital labour exploitation, and invisible infrastructures. Formerly at HfG Karlsruhe, where she taught media theory and coordinated a research group on critical AI, she is now a Research Fellow at TU Dresden.

Stefanos Levidis is a spatial and visual researcher, and is the co-founder and co-director of Forensic Architecture Initiative Athens (FAIA). Stefanos has been working with Forensic Architecture and Forensis since 2016, overseeing the agencies’ work on borders and migration and holds a PhD from the Centre for Research Architecture, Goldsmiths.

Hassan Ould Moctar is a Lecturer in the Anthropology of Migration at SOAS, University of London. He holds a PhD in Development Studies which he obtained from SOAS. His research focuses on the relationship between migration, borders, and development processes, with a regional focus on Mauritania, the West African Sahel, and the Sahara.

Register here

More about the series:

Managing Displacement explores the intricate web of migration management within and beyond Europe’s borders. Each publication begins with a theme or term to examine processes that restrict, surveil, or obscure displaced people.

The first publication, Outsourcing, examines how the EU extends its borders beyond the continent by outsourcing border control. Recognising this practice within a historical trajectory of colonial ordering, it shows how responsibility is systematically deferred and how racist structures are propagated through border management.

Outsourcing contributors: Border Violence Monitoring Network, FRAUD, Nadine El-Enany, Hassan Ould Moctar.

The second publication, Extraction, offers a transhistorical perspective on contemporary border systems. The contributions explore extraction as a process that drives displacement, with enduring effects due to environmental devastation. They also examine extraction as a direct mechanism of border management that financially profits from those who are displaced.

Extraction contributors: Ariana Dongus, Radha D’Souza, Stefanos Levidis, Angela Melitopoulos.

‘Managing Displacement’ is a publication series that explores the intricate web of migration management within and beyond Europe’s borders. Each publication begins with a theme, or term, in order to examine processes that restrict, surveil or obscure displaced people.

—

Those displaced and seeking to inhabit the social, political, and economic imaginaries of ‘Europe’ are met with an increasingly hostile frontier. The confluence of obscure legal processes, rising anti-migrant rhetoric, and the use of heavily funded private contractors has enforced the idea of Europe as a ‘fortress’. The very notion of Europe – freedom of movement for some and restriction for others – is upheld through austere migration policy by the European Union, influencing many aspects of political life on the continent and beyond.

Each book in the series delves into a term and a process deployed to restrict, surveil, or obscure displaced peoples. Underpinning the publications is the understanding that displacement is deeply entangled with historical legacies of colonialism, resource extraction, and late-stage capitalism. We seek to redress the framing of displacement as something to be managed, by re-defining the processes employed to do so.

Edited by System of Systems
Published in December 2024

Designed by Rose Nordin
Copyedited by Harriet Foyster

Theory on Demand #54

In/Convenience: Inhabiting the Logistical Surround

Edited by Joshua Neves and Marc Steinberg

Convenience is the feeling and aspiration that animates our platformed present. As such, it poses urgent techno-political questions about the everyday digital habitus. From next-day delivery, gig work, and tele-health to cashless payment systems, data centers, and policing – convenience is an affordance and an enclosure; our logistical surround. Driving every experience of convenience is the precarious work, proprietary algorithms, or predatory schemes that subtend it. This collaborative book traces how the logistical surround is transformed by thickening digital economies and networked rituals, examining contemporary conveniences across a wide range of practices and geographies. Contributors examine the ineluctable relation between convenience and its constitutive opposite, inconvenience, considering its infrastructural, affective, and compulsory dimensions. Living in convenience is thus both a hyper visible manifestation of so-called late capitalism and a pervasive mood that fades into the background (like the data centers that power it). Bringing the agonistic relation of in/convenience to center stage, this volume analyzes the logistics of delivery, streaming porn, cloud computing, water infrastructures, smartness paradigms, convenience stores, sleep apps, surveillance, AI ethics, and much more – rethinking the cultural politics of convenience for the present conjuncture.

Contributors: Darren Byler, Orit Halpern, Armin Beverungen, Mél Hogan, Steven Gonzalez, Tung Hui-Hu, Susanna Paasonen, Neta Alexander, Rahul Mukherjee, Liza Rose Cirolia, Andrea Pollio, Tomasz Hollanek, Maya Indira Ganesh

Joshua Neves is Associate Professor, Concordia University, and author of Underglobalization: Beijing’s Media Urbanism and the Chimera of Legitimacy. Marc Steinberg is Professor of Cinema, Concordia University, and author of The Platform Economy: How Japan Transformed the Consumer Internet.

Order a copy or download publication HERE

A Conversation by Todd Craig and LeBrandon Smith

Happy Hip Hop History Month! Last week writer, educator and DJ Todd Craig and cultural curator and social impact leader LeBrandon Smith kicked off their three part series parsing out this past spring’s beef between Kendrick Lamar and Drake, Hip Hop history in the making. We left off in the breath-holding moment just after Kendrick released “Euphoria” and “6:16 in LA” after eleven days of anticipation. Since the dust has settled a bit between K-Dot and OVO, it’s the perfect time for these intergenerational Hip Hop heads to tap in and sort out what this epic beef really meant for the artists, the sound, and most importantly, the culture. School is IN, yall!  Click this link to read Part I; click this link to read Part II. And yes, we know a new Kendrick album came out! #whew #tvoff #whatatimetobealive

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Approximately 14 hours after Kendrick released “6:16 in LA,” Drake responded with “Family Matters” on May 3, 2024. We’re connecting it to the ending snippet of “Push Ups,” which insinuates it may have been recorded even before the prior two Kendrick songs (we also get this song as a video, so the visuals add another element).

The three-part diss track aims at multiple people (Rick Ross, A$AP Rocky, the Weeknd [aka Abel Tesfaye], Metro Boomin and others), but its most disrespectful lines are clearly aimed at Kendrick. This is really and truly the moment when Drake moves to bring Kendrick’s family into his bars. He also aims at Kendrick’s blackness in a confusing line, saying “always rappin’ like you ‘bout to get the slaves freed/ You just actin’ like an activist, it’s make-believe.” This was a line we both agreed was not only a problematic misstep, but would taint some of the other formative disses in the song. In a moment where Drake’s own blackness and identity were in question, calling his own supporters – Black people – “slaves,” who need to get “freed” does more work to prove Kendrick’s point than to further Drake’s lyrical prowess on the scorecard. Todd also identified the second verse of “Family Matters” (from 2:43-5:15) as the most formidable – the beat switch, cadence and flow, that pocket Drake taps into lyrically is one of his best rapping moments of the battle. Drake’s flow in this part is impeccable, as we see him rhyming in rapid fire, sending shots against multiple foes.

LeBrandon tapped into the third verse (5:16 to 7:36), when out the gate, Drake says “Kendrick just opened his mouth, somebody hand him a Grammy right now.” Drake is at his best when he’s being facetious and petty and his hate for the Grammys is well documented. Drake disrespecting revered entities during this battle was enjoyable and garnered attention; anytime you can call an opponent’s accolades into question – whether it’s a Grammy or a Pulitzer – it’s helpful in a rap battle. LeBrandon could also imagine Kendrick chuckling at a few of the height one-liners like “These bars go over Kenny’s head no matter what I say,” as K.Dot manically crafted his response. 

LeBrandon also pointed out that ownership of jewelry in Hip Hop is a staple, so he appreciated the flex of “You wanna take up for Pharrell?/ Then come get his legacy outta my house.” Since when is it acceptable for another rapper to own jewelry you purchased and proudly wore? We understand Drake owning Pharrell’s jewelry isn’t to pay homage, but to spite Pharrell and The Clipse. The quote is a great retort by Drake, and a keen reminder of how villainous and strategic he can be. This bar felt like the Michael Jordan shrug in audio form. Regardless of how Drake acquired the jewelry, he has it and that matters, and creating a visual in New Ho King with these pieces is devious work. 

LeBrandon literally let out an audible sigh when we heard Drake say, “Your daddy got robbed by Top…” Rap is entertainment so there’s an expectation that lies may surface. Great lyrical battles are like playing the dozens: to garner the most rousing response from the audience, folks will definitely exaggerate. But we agreed that this line ain’t that. This is just straight up faulty comprehension, as the story of Kendrick’s dad and Top Dog’s meeting (in the song, “DUCKWORTH” ) was not a robbery narrative. Part of war is knowing your opponent’s weaknesses and “DUCKWORTH” as a song is bulletproof.

After Drake’s brash talking on both the verses and outro of “Taylor Made Freestyle” warning Kendrick he should be prepared, this uninformed lyrical analysis, or misstep at rewriting the factual narrative is disappointing, specifically because Drake is so talented; misses like this in the midst of a legendary battle makes him look foolish and lazy. Unfortunately, this isn’t the only time Drake does this during the battle, but we found this occurrence quite jarring.

We both agreed the craziest turn of events for the battle was when MINUTES after “Family Matters” dropped, Kendrick responded with “Meet the Grahams”: the darkest and most sinister song of the battle. The way in which Kendrick composed an open letter to members of Drake’s family after Drake mentioned Kendrick’s fiancé by name along with other accusations, put Kendrick in a space he describes, saying “this supposed to be a good exhibition within the game/ But you fucked up the moment you called out my family’s name/ Why you had to stoop so low to discredit some decent people?/ Guess integrity is lost when the metaphors doesn’t reach you.” This song exemplifies why Kendrick has been given the “BoogeyMan” moniker. These dark and disturbing lyrics are what nightmares are made of; and what better way to tap into such a dark landscape than with an eerie beat produced by the Alchemist.

We agreed it was the moment in the battle where Kendrick’s cerebral nature fully set in: new vocals, new flows and a new attack on Drake’s morals and character. At this point in the battle, Todd hoped Drake stopped rhyming because of just how dark this sonic happening was. “Meet the Grahams” is a cerebral and intense listening experience that took the battle to a whole other level. In addition, K.Dot showed us just how much he liked “Back to Back,” as he would double down and double-drop again, this time with the anthem “Not Like Us.” We both agreed that “Meet the Grahams” was the dark, uncomfortable turn, and “Not Like Us” felt like the sonic nails in the coffin for the battle. Besides the absolute instrumental bop DJ Mustard provides for Kendrick, the lyrics coupled with the anthem-feeling hook felt like Kendrick had outsmarted Drake, and simply beat him to the “bop-punch” that we’ve known Drake to produce.

When we listened to the bars, “I’m finna pass on this body, I’m John Stockton/ Beat your ass and hide the Bible if God watchin’/ Sometimes you gotta pop out and show niggas,” we knew it was going to be downhill for Drake. As Kendrick moved through the verses and tapped into the last verse with the lesson on Drake’s sonic connections to Atlanta, and calling him a “colonizer,” an important sentiment popped up for Todd. What’s really deceptive about these lines is that Kendrick is leaning into generational and cultural Blackness. He does it earlier in the references that LeBrandon picked up on with hair and “the braids.” But these sayings K.Dot continuously extols not only emanate from Southern culture, but are also older sentiments from elders in the Black community. So when Kendrick inserts these lines, they’re more harsh than even some of the direct disses, because they lean into Black American culture in ways that Drake would never understand as either a Canadian or a kid visiting his dad in the states (evidenced by “always rappin’ like you ‘bout to get the slaves freed”). However, sonically, it feels “super Black” – putting Black listeners right at home, like they’re hearing their grandma chastise someone. So by the time Kendrick gets to the call and response moment of “Lemme hear you say ‘O-V-Hoe’” (again, another Black trope that transcends Hip Hop), as listeners, we already feel like we’re in the livest cook-out and block party of the summer!

As we tuned into “The Heart Part 6” on May 5, 2024, we both agreed Drake sounded defeated, he was clearly waving the white flag, and he was continuing down the road of missteps that were no longer forgivable. When he lays the bars, “My Montreal connects stand up, not fall down/the ones that you’re gettin’ your stories from, they all clowns,” only to follow up three bars later with, “we plotted for a week and then we fed you the information,” it became clear that even Drake wasn’t sure how to move through the rest of the song as well as the battle. This was another unforced error, a critical misstep Drake simply could not afford at this juncture.

When thinking of this moment alongside Drake’s lack of comprehension around Kendrick’s song, “Mother I Sober,” (where Kendrick touches on abuse in his family – not to be confused with a personal admission of sexual abuse) this stands as Drake’s weakest song in the battle. It also doesn’t stand close to Kendrick’s initial chess move of usurping Drake’s “timestamp songs” – when Kendrick presents “6:16 in LA” (a series Drake has used on almost all of his albums), it proves to be a more robust offering than “The Heart Part 6” (a series Kendrick has used in his career). After this offering from Drake, we see The Ken and Friends: Pop Out (a concert streamed live via Amazon Prime on June 19, 2024: Juneteenth), followed by the “Not Like Us” video (which was released on July 4, 2024: Independence Day). These two drops on cultural “Independence Days” just furthers the notion that Kendrick had a level of vision and foresight far beyond where Drake could imagine. By “The Heart Part 6,” we also agreed Drake thought the song and visuals to “Family Matters” (which was probably recorded around the same time as “Push Ups” and “Taylor Made Freestyle”) would be the end of the battle with Kendrick. An egregious misstep by both Drake and his team to underestimate the BoogeyMan in such a way. 

We close this article sharing an important intergenerational conversation that will serve as a Hip Hop cultural landmark. We’ve both seen various videos and TikToks deconstructing many of the “Easter eggs” left by both Drake and Kendrick in this battle. We hope this article serves as another perspective on how we might be able to think about these songs and this battle from a music as well as a cultural perspective, specifically as it relates to all things Hip Hop. And again, we both agreed there are complicated messages and moments in the battle that require further attention and future analysis.

We also felt a responsibility in sharing this dialogue in an academic space as two avid Hip Hop listeners from two different generations with two different seasoned and highly informed viewpoints. Our perspectives on Hip Hop are forever altered, especially with this battle following the 50th anniversary of the culture last year. So we feel obliged to document this moment, as the battle raised a series of questions for us. We introduce some of those questions throughout the article, while some questions might be answered over time, and others might never see a response. Each of our questions generate analysis that will remain critically relevant to the resonance of this historic battle, which has turned into a cultural moment and movement. It’s crucial to consider the artistic creation outside of any two individuals, as Hip Hop proved with this battle that it remains the biggest culture shaper in our world today.

We hope to see your thoughts on the topic, and, just like Kendrick, we reserve the right to return, and to even “pop out” one more time. . .Superbowl LVIII?  

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Our Icon for this series is a mash up of “Kendrick Lamar (Sziget Festival 2018)” taken by Flickr User Peter Ohnacker (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0) and “Drake, Telenor Arena 2017” taken by Flickr User Kim Erlandsen, NRK P3 (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

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Todd Craig (he/him) is a writer, educator and DJ whose career meshes his love of writing, teaching and music. His research inhabits the intersection of writing and rhetoric, sound studies and Hip Hop studies. He is the author of “K for the Way”: DJ Rhetoric and Literacy for 21st Century Writing Studies (Utah State University Press) which examines the Hip Hop DJ as twenty-first century new media reader, writer, and creator of the discursive elements of DJ rhetoric and literacy. Craig’s publications include the multimodal novel tor’cha (pronounced “torture”), and essays in various edited collections and scholarly journals including The Bloomsbury Handbook of Hip Hop Pedagogy, Amplifying Soundwriting, Methods and Methodologies for Research in Digital Writing and Rhetoric, Fiction International, Radical Teacher, Modern Language Studies, Changing English, Kairos, Composition Studies and Sounding Out! Dr. Craig teaches courses on writing, rhetoric, African American and Hip Hop Studies, and is the co-host of the podcast Stuck off the Realness with multi-platinum recording artist Havoc of Mobb Deep. Presently, Craig is an Associate Professor of African American Studies at New York City College of Technology and English at the CUNY Graduate Center.

LeBrandon Smith (he/him) is a cultural curator and social impact leader born and raised in Brooklyn and Queens, respectively.  Coming from New York City, his efforts to bridge gaps, and build  community have been central to his work, but most notably his passion for music has fueled his career. His programming  has been seen throughout the Metropolitan area, including historical venues like Carnegie Hall, The Museum of the City of NY (MCNY) and Brooklyn Public Library.

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REWIND!…If you liked this post, you may also dig:

The Braids, The Bars, and the Blackness: Ruminations on Hip Hop’s World War III – Drake versus Kendrick (Part One): Todd Craig and LeBrandon Smith 

The Braids, The Bars, and the Blackness: Ruminations on Hip Hop’s World War III – Drake versus Kendrick (Part Two): Todd Craig and LeBrandon Smith 

“Heavy Airplay, All Day with No Chorus”: Classroom Sonic Consciousness in the Playlist Project—Todd Craig

SO! Reads: “K for the Way”: DJ Rhetoric and Literacy for 21st Century Writing Studies—DeVaughn (Dev) Harris 

SO! Amplifies: Regina Bradley’s Outkasted Conversations

Sounding Out! Podcast #28: Off the 60: A Mix-Tape Dedication to Los Angeles–Jennifer Lynn Stoever

multidimensionality

imperfection

instability

fluidity

In a world where technology redefines our perception of selfhood, identity becomes fluid, fragmented, and constantly evolving. My project, infiniteartist, is a multi-channel simulation that delves into this complexity by exploring alternative versions of identity through digital tools such as algorithms, AI, and generative processes.

infiniteartist embraces a multi-faceted approach, transcending the confines of a single medium or form. It combines performance, video performance, animation, and video to create a dynamic and integrative body of work. These diverse methods are not merely functional; they also serve as tools for delving into and reimagining the fluidity of identity in alternative forms. Through this exploration, I seek to capture the ongoing, boundless evolution and representation of my own identity, highlighting its complexity and multiplicity, while also acknowledging its instability, impermanence, and transformation.

Post-face and Fluidity of Identity

infiniteartist expands the term post-face, coined by Anna Szyjkowska-Piotrowska in her book Po-twarz. Przekraczanie widzenia w sztuce i technologii (Post-face. Transcending Vision in Art and Technology). Which plays a crucial role in understanding contemporary shifts in how identity and the face are perceived in art. The paradigm of the face, in its modern, proto-ethical version, still reaches for axiological concepts but is based on symbolic oppositional poles — emotions and affect, identity and subjectivity, all becoming unstable, fluid, and oscillating between self-affirmation and self-loss. This fluidity and uncertainty define the modern face paradigm, shaping it within the context of art. Contemporary artists, following these theories, blur the dichotomy of concepts such as interior/exterior, soul/body, human/animal, and feminine/masculine. The face, no longer just a face but a post-face, continues its presence in the realm of visual representation, undergoing dynamic transformations in the way it is depicted. It becomes a particular medium — a screen, carrying complex, often contradictory messages.

Szyjkowska-Piotrowska emphasizes that we no longer deal with a face in the traditional sense but with a post-face. It is a face in motion, subject to profanation, stripped of its sacred aura. The concept of post-face forces us to experience the sublime anew, revealing the uncertainty of identity and its constant transformation. The face transformed into a mask causes the disappearance of the traditional symbol of a fixed, singular identity, leading to its fluidity and instability, which in the modern paradigm, for many artists, takes the form of the post-face. This process is based on symbolic oppositional poles, questioning fundamental concepts of European humanism — identity, and unity.

Redefining the Traditional Face in The Digital Age

In the digital and media age, where the image of the face is often manipulated, processed, or even completely altered through digital technology. Unlike the traditional perception of the face as a carrier of identity and emotional expression, the concept of the post-face reveals the issue of the cultural and social construction of facial imagery, which can be shaped, modified, and distributed in various ways in the media space. The post-face becomes a tool for producing a subject, by annexing elements of identity, often utilizing already existing motifs in culture, symbols, and aesthetic paradigms. This practice involves the repetition of stereotypes, roles, and symbolic elements associated with visual culture. Contemporary art, characterized by the ubiquity of images and their ease of reproduction, enters a phase of a crisis of representation. The boundaries between reality and its digital representations are increasingly fluid, which, in turn, leads to the liquefaction of both identity and the medium itself. 

AI, as the next stage of the post-face, becomes a significant element in this process. It represents a technological evolution that allows for the generation of faces on demand, thus leading to the extreme virtualization of images. The emergence of artificially generated faces disrupts the balance between the biological and digital realms, changing the way we perceive the boundaries between dichotomies. As a result, we witness a new definition of identity, where the lines between the human and the non-human become increasingly blurred, and the post-face serves as a tool for expressing this ongoing transformation.

Generating Multiple Identities

Modern technologies and the increasingly radical virtualization of art create space for more sophisticated tools and opportunities to express complex and/or simulated identities. In the context of new media art, the multivoiced and multi-imaged nature of identity gains a clearer representation. Images no longer limit themselves to the simple reproduction of reality; on the contrary, they can transform or distort it, distancing us from its original essence. This uncertainty, or even ambiguity of images, has always evoked unease. There is also the possibility that images conceal an absence—a lack of something that has passed, disappeared, or perhaps never existed. Instead of reflecting reality, an image can replace or displace it, surpassing the boundaries of categorization as true or false. As a result, it becomes more real than reality itself, transitioning into the realm of simulation.

I broke down my identity, cataloged it, and then multiplied it. At the beginning, there was a database. A collection created from my thoughts and AI suggestions, divided into environments, art movements, media, nightmares, decisions, and health issues. From this, models were generated, further equipped with random levels of ego, condition, and susceptibility to external influences, as well as the degree of attitude toward academia, the world, and the art market. Next, they were cataloged with an individual number. 

Based on their traits, the AI-generated a verbal description of the image, which was then illustrated by an algorithm that created an image using my likeness as a reference point. Another algorithm brought them to life and allowed them to move and speak with my cloned voice. They narrate their characteristics, which were written by the AI.

The embodiment of specific traits with a given appearance reveals the physiognomic interpretation followed by AI. This way of perceiving is the result of analyzing visual data and machine learning algorithms, which attempt to assign specific internal meanings or values to particular external symptoms and signs, thus returning to the face as an icon. However, the focus on the aesthetic aspects of the face strips it of its privileged, metaphysical character. Making the algorithms, controlled and selected by humans, tools for creating new masks.

The presentation of multiple versions serves to articulate a fragmented and simulated identity. The infinitemodels represent alternative possibilities or paths that could have been or are still available, reflecting the constantly changing nature of identity. The fact that the models contain imperfections and flaws reflects the human condition—they do not represent an ideal or a singular form, but rather reveal the uncertainty and disorientation of the individual in today’s world, where identity is often defined by media representation and cultural consumption. In this context, the artist becomes an unstable product, subject to market and media pressure—this can lead to a loss of authenticity and personal integrity, encouraging the adoption of multiple masks.

These models are not valued in any way, meaning they are neither judged nor hierarchized in terms of their importance or quality; each is treated as equal to the others. The work focuses on the hybrid construct of identity—it operates within a symbolic system where the image and female identity receive a completely different representation, reflecting a more complex and multi-dimensional experience of existence that serves as a space for diverse narratives and perspectives.

The image, understood as a representation, transcends individuality in an attempt to reveal more general and symbolic layers — the presented work creates a symbiotic connection between technology and human expression — an artificiality and unnaturalness are palpable, emphasizing that, even today, there remains a boundary between the human and the non-human, while simultaneously provoking reflection on the impact of modern technologies on the future perception of identity. They are grotesque and unsettling, and some of them I can barely look at. They remind me of talking heads from TikTok, they remind me of myself. They are everything I can be and everything I cannot be. They are made by me, yet at the same time, I have nothing to do with them.

Algorithmic Identity

The blurring of dichotomy is revealed in the work actualmodel, which refers to aspirations to transform human identity into a database controlled by algorithms. The current identity is randomly selected from the data set, becoming a tool for the creation and refinement of the subject through the annexation of elements and paradigms from the digital world of life simulators. The work illustrates the continuous transformations of models, showcasing the current status, detached from my physical form. This dynamic relates to the process of cataloging and exposing inner values that are presented outwardly.

In this sense, the concept of actualmodel echoes the notion of the face-icon found in metaphysical thought and physiognomic interpretation. Here, external symptoms and signs serve as tools for inferring what is hidden, ineffable, and elusive. Just as the classical approach to the face in the tradition of portrait painting assumes the possibility of expressing the inner self through external features, actualmodel explores how identity—rooted in internal qualities—is externalized, shaped, and displayed, albeit through the mechanisms of the digital and algorithmic world.

In the context of a modern society where individuals are increasingly perceived as products, this approach refers to mechanisms in which people are compelled to display and promote their traits to attract attention and gain social acceptance. Identity is often not only revealed externally but also simulated to fit into desired frameworks. Like the classical portrait, which seeks to convey the inner through the outer, actualmodel underscores the interplay between internal substance and external representation, albeit through the lens of digital transformation and simulation.

These issues are explored in the video performance panelsofmodelselection, which delves into the construction of identity through the presentation of various interactions influencing identity formation. In the video, I am dressed in attire matching the animation’s color palette, surrounded by six panels, each presenting different decisions and aspects of identity-building within the artistic world. The work appropriates the interaction selection mechanism from the life simulation game The Sims 2. By incorporating this dynamic into the performance I draw a parallel between creating and altering identities within a virtual space and the process of constructing identity in the real world.

In The Sims 2, all actions are predefined by the game’s programming, and similarly, in real life, the “choices” individuals face are often shaped by societal structures, expectations, and technological interfaces. By appropriating this mechanic, the artwork blurs the boundary between digital and real-world identity construction, questioning to what extent our “authentic” selves are products of external systems and frameworks. The digital world of life simulators, originally modeled after real life, now loop back to influence it, blurring the boundaries between the two realms.

The final component of the artistic project is the modelenvironment, which represents a deeper engagement between the real image and the virtual world governed by algorithms. This performance utilizes the process of live keying, where my physical presence is captured in real time and then transferred into virtual environments generated entirely by an algorithm. During the exhibition, I physically stood in front of a green screen, and my image was streamed live onto the gallery space, merging my real-world presence with AI-generated environments. The live feed became a bridge between these two realms, allowing the audience to witness a real-time transformation of my body and image into a fully digital context. This dynamic process blurred the lines between what was physically present in the gallery and what was algorithmically created, challenging the traditional expectations of performance art.

By wearing the same outfit as in the panelsofmodelselection, I achieved an effect of physical/digital multiplicity, where the simultaneous presence of my physical form and two digital counterparts—one from the video and one generated live—obscured the reality of the performance. At first, the audience didn’t realize that one of the representations was a live projection, and later they struggled to distinguish which was the pre-recorded video and which was the live projection.

Instead of simply mirroring reality, the performance sought to transform and distort it, removing it from its original context and redefining the terms of authenticity. By transcending the binary of true and false, the act of transformation became a simulation of reality. Through this performance, I engage with the idea of identity as something malleable and shifting, especially in the context of contemporary digital culture. The performance questions how much of our identity is truly “real,” and to what extent it is shaped or even constructed through external systems, such as algorithms and digital media. Ultimately, the modelenvironment demonstrates the complex relationship between physical and virtual selves, offering a space where the boundaries between reality and simulation are no longer clear-cut but are in a constant state of negotiation.

Self

Using my own image has been a long-standing practice in my work, where I’ve consistently employed my likeness as a tool of expression. The act of presenting my face and body is not simply about performing an identity or creating an avatar; it’s about grounding the work in the lived, embodied self. A virtual persona lacks the inherent human experience that my identity carries—because, to have a true post-face, one must first have a face.

The artist’s face and body, as a result of tensions and the transformative power of art, have become an ongoing and essential reflection in the context of contemporary Western European culture. The artist’s physiognomy, in this sense, acts as a symbolic field where the dynamic interaction between art and society unfolds. This exploration is deeply tied to understanding how the artist’s face and body serve as artistic tools, as well as the implications of this in the creation of artworks.

By using my face and body, I am making a statement about the power of lived experience in the creation of art. My work isn’t simply about visual representation; it’s about the continuous transformation of my dentity through art, and ultimately, this process is about me. It’s rooted in my practice and my reflection on how we, as individuals, navigate and negotiate our identities in a world shaped by both traditional and digital forces.

The work premiered in June 2024 at Nowa Scena, Poznań. In November 2024, it was showcased during the Narracje as part of the 44th edition of the Maria Dokowicz competition in Poznań, where it received the Special Rector’s Award from the University of the Arts Poznań (UAP).