Surpassing r=a(1-sinθ)

Qi Mu Space is pleased to announce the opening of Supassing r=a(1-sinθ), a special project curated by Iris LONG. The exhibition will last until 14th of October, 2018.

I. Fleeting Balance

Poetry written by Microsoft's AI has been published with no need to maintain copyright protection; Coditany of Timeness, a heavy-metal album and software imitating Lichtenstein's work, have been written by bots; the eccentric Debater won against humans by getting more votes from the public; and Siri, Cortana, Alexa, and other digital voice assistants, just as the neural network encryption algorithms (Alice/Bob/Eve) created by Google Brain, were all given human names. Today, after a long period of evolution, the model of interaction between humans and technology seems to have reached a brief state of dynamic balance. People have begun to artistically interpret and beautify science, making up for the gap between social audiences and hardcore technology, something utterly incomprehensible to the majority of people around the globe.

II. Metadomain

The intermingling of technology and art has allowed for the existence of a metadomain, where individuals can engage in gamematic, story-like creation not aimed at functionality. This exhibition will be based on this dynamic balance between humans and machines. It presents the issues of technology and art from a more equal and compatible perspective. There will be no "technological" raw materials (such as bare circuit boards) on the site, and neither will there be any particular preference between science and art.

III. Apeiron

Anaximander, a philosopher of the Milesian School in Ancient Greece, believed that different kinds of substances in the world came from a basic component called apeiron ("the infinite"). Today, data has become this basic ingredient. Data exists in the structures of fundamental algorithms, and even though people use it every day, they do not know much about it. Technology has allowed people to measure and quantify time, space, environment, and even the spiritual domain in a very precise way. This means that the methods and logic of testing, quantifying, and categorizing, originally applied in the field of information and machinery, are now starting to be applied elsewhere. This has led to a tendency for an over-simplification of human society, the emergence of data authoritarianism and new social classes, and even the re-examination and possibly elimination of existing human values.

IV. This One Word

The "metadomain" mentioned above, along with the continuous integration of mankind and technology, not only makes up for the gap between hardcore technology and social audiences, but also, with a truly Dadaist attitude, provides a tabula rasa to the fast-developing society of the computer age, allowing people to show the expanse of their creativity. The aim is not to build a magnificent spectacle in this open "metadomain". Flaubert said, "There existed only one way of expressing a thing, one word to use, one adjective to qualify it, and one verb to give it life." That is why people strive toward superhuman labor to discover, in each phrase, that very word, epithet, and verb.

V. The Exhibition

The goal of this exhibition: finding that one word.

SPECIAL PROGRAMS

• In the Anonymous Room

Exhibiting artists residing in different time zones are invited to co-edit a text file on Google Doc. The program simulates an anonymous room for free conversation, without obligatory updating “deadline” and pressure of real-time communication.  The theme of this document is about today’s life and technological environment; the content can either be documentation of everyday moments or serious writing, reading notes, random chats or self-questioning. The final document will be released together with the exhibition without announcing the writers behind each sentence.

• The Curious Tool

“Tools” often open up new creative dimensions. Tools used by artists/creators can already form a micro archaeological subject. Exhibiting artist, on various levels, employ “curious tools”: machine learning, Amazon Mechanical Turk, chemical processes, etc. The curator of the show will compose six short interviews with artists regarding their “tools”.