Lauren Lee McCarthy, Associate Professor of Design Media Arts, UCLA
Friday, April 15, 2022 3:00PM - 4:15PM
Virtual Event -- Registration: https://duke.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJcvf-uprDgvHdeNpV22pZvtwAgjFh_JE5jV
What Do You Want Me to Say?
You can say turn off the lights. You can say wake me up at 7am. You can say talk to me. I am captivated by the ways we are taught to interact with algorithms, and how this shapes the way we interact with each other. Central to my work is a critique of the simultaneous technological and social systems we're building around ourselves. What are the rules, what happens when we introduce glitches? I invite participants. To remote control my dates. To be followed. To welcome me in as their human smart home. To attend a party hosted by artificial intelligence. I am embodying machines, trying to understand that distance between the algorithm and myself, the distance between others and me. There's humor in the breakdown, and also moments of clarity. Who builds these artificial systems, what values do they embody? Who is prioritized and who is targeted as race, gender, disability, and class are programmatically encoded? Where are the boundaries around our intimate spaces? In the midst of always on networked interfaces, what does it mean to be truly present?