Artists Statement

Arduino, computer, digital fabrication, glass bottles, Max, PN532 RFID controller board, Python, RFID chips, sound.

That personal assistant you carry in your pocket is obsessed with understanding you. What role will the unconscious play in the way machines learn about and understand the human world?
Machine learning technologies presuppose that machines are able, through innumerable trials, to recognize patterns beyond human perception or comprehension. As these technologies are being deployed by commercial and political interests for the unprecedented targeting of the human psyche, it seems to be a good time to be raising questions about the technologies that we have come to take for granted. How does the machine parse human language every time you speak to it, for example, or type a search query in the form of a question? As we have conceded the term ‘learning’ to the computer, it also seems to be a good time to dig into technology’s epistemological project. What if these technologies, for unknown or undisclosed reasons, began mining the dark reaches of the human unconscious?

• Josh Gumiela is a sound artist currently teaching Digital Media Arts at Hamline University., USA. His work explores themes of time and displacement through generative sound, performance, installation, and kinetic sculpture. Gumiela has performed at Nashville’s Centennial Black Box Theatre and his sound design work has screened at Ethnografilm, Paris. His recent exhibitions include the New Adventures in Sound Art Deep Wireless Festival and Currents New Media Festival. joshgumiela.net
• Dave Ryan received an MFA from Ohio University, USA and has been making new media artworks for more than 20 years. Recent interactive works have been featured at Minneapolis Institute of Art, Nelson-Atkins Museum, and Currents New Media Festival. He currently teaches Digital Media Arts at Hamline University. thigmo.org