What a thoughtful and thorough review - I look forward to reading the book Warmly Meredith
On Sat, Sep 3, 2022 at 7:08 AM marc.garrett via NetBehaviour < netbehaviour@lists.netbehaviour.org> wrote: > Hi all, > > Just saw a review of Frankenstein Reanimated and because some of you on > the list are in the book I thought you'd be interested in reading it. > > Mytho recommends (Phil Smith): > > Frankenstein Reanimated: Creation & Technology in the 21st Century (Eds. > Marc Garrett & Yiannis Colakides) Torque Editions, 2022 > https://www.facebook.com/mythogeography/posts/5907704932592518 > > This has been a very strange read for me. I have no attraction to or > understanding of the technical side of programming. I read Erik Davis’s > ‘TechGnosis’ back in 1998 when it first came out and, already anti-gnostic > and anti-transcendentalist, my suspicions about an information-based > society were heightened. I have pretty much remained that way ever since; > extending my wariness to information technology-based arts. Perhaps, I just > haven’t seen that wonderful piece to change my mind, though even one of the > artists interviewed in ‘Frankenstein Reanimated’ worries at the “VR > Headsets that provide clothes for hackneyed metaphors”. > > What brought me to read the book is my engagement with Mary Shelley’s > novel ‘Frankenstein or The Modern Prometheus’, co-writing a stage > adaptation (which also drew on the Universal movies) back in 2005, which > has continued to tour intermittently ever since and was last year turned > into a musical at the Deutsches Theater in Munich. The early parts of > ‘Frankenstein Re-Animated’ address the abiding significance of the novel in > some detail, and then the interviews with various ‘media artists’ take over > – a monster taking control of its own life – and the book moves further > away from Mary Shelley and her engagement with stitching flesh and sparking > philosophy in dead brain matter. > In his preface, Yiannis Colakides describes “a widening knowledge-gap in > the use and understanding of technologies” between hackers who operate as a > “vectoralist class.... [who] control.... information flows; and the > majority who are all too often taken for a ride by their technologies”. It > is this problematic relationship that seems to haunt – as Mary Shelley’s > monster plagues its creator, asking difficult questions and exacting > revenge – the artworks that ‘Frankenstein Reanimated’ describes and > discusses. In the vast majority of the examples – drawn from exhibitions in > Gíjon, London and Limassol – the technologies are deployed to critique and > even undo themselves; many draw on what Marc Garrett describes as the > effects of the new technologies to “have profoundly displaced and decentred > how we understand humans and humanity’s agency and corporality” in order to > explore those displacements and decentrings in what Gregory Sholette and > Olga Kopenkina call the “capitalist-realist... un-present”. > > Artworks explore the “potential harm of recognition technology”, how > technology carries racial assumptions as ‘universals’; gallery visitors are > drawn into making and choosing assumptions for image filtration. But when > an artist says “What is amazing to me.... is that people really get into > labelling each other” you want to shout back – ‘but that is what your > artwork asks them to do!’ Rather like the options in Luke Rhinehart’s > (George Cockcroft’s) ‘The Dice Man’ (1971) or Marina Abramovic’s Rhythm 0 > (1974) – why are the options of sexual assault, a bullet and a gun, even in > there? There is an inbuilt manipulation that looks like choice or agency; > an implication and incorporation that is within the very structures and > techniques of the works that both address their themes in critique and > enact them simultaneously. It is jaw-dropping to read an artist who first > explains their work as “inspired.... by reading... about the autonomous > weapons systems... which... ‘conflate the act of seeing and killing’” and > then, on being asked to explain why the “visual universe” of their piece is > “so cold and clean”, replies that it is “just a pragmatic choice.... > everything that I am not trying to point to is at default value”. > > But wasn’t Mary Shelley starting with a default value, with a dismembered > body/bodies, bringing the default of the graveyard to life and not only > asking questions of it, but having it ask questions of everything. Pushing > the new technologies beyond their functional limits often has intriguing > and attention-grabbing effects, distorting figures and landscapes in ways > reminiscent of historical and contemporary human artists, but then the > suspicion is all the time that these effects are the remnants of the art > history education of the programmers rather than any novel interruption of > productions of the obvious. It is disheartening to read an artist bemoan > “the pre-existing bias of my initial dataset... The results may have been > further distorted by technical bias due to technical constraints of the > algorithm”. As artist Mary Flanagan says, almost in despair: “I keep > wondering why we are on this quest to make artificial systems emotive.... > why we invent things just to invent them, thinking that somehow anything > new improves our lives”. And yet the artworks keep on coming as each new > wave of artists ‘discovers’ the possibilities of (and funding for) arts and > new technologies. > > If I came away with a slightly refined animosity, I would not want to > discourage anyone from reading this book; it is endlessly fascinating. It > never flinches from the difficulty of this work and the mind-bending > tangles that contort the artists working with it, often in interfaces with > terrifying state and fiscal systems. Paul Vanousse’s article (he was > investigated by the FBI who attempted to enter his studio and home, two of > his previous collaborators were prosecuted) is a welcome reminder of just > how dangerous some of these themes/threats can be. > > ‘Frankenstein Reanimated’ is perhaps most powerful and engaging when it > addresses the technology not as a “tool” or an expansion of the artists’ > themes, but as an agency in itself: “a growing chorus of techno-objects > that insistently asks us to drill the Arctic, build pipelines, burn coal” > (Eugenio Tisselli). The “monster” does not feed us, it wants us to feed it, > otherwise, it threatens, it will takes its revenge; those who serve and > obey it can participate in its feeding frenzy “where the secret sauce of > memetic media meets the magic sauce of right-wing billionaires, > underwriting political campaigns to facilitate a wholesale move to the hard > right” (Ami Clarke). But as Mary Flanagan says: “why are we on this quest?” > > Anyone interested in a copy go here - > https://torquetorque.net/publications/frankenstein-reanimated/ > > > > Wishing you well > > Marc > > =============> > > DR Marc Garrett - https://marcgarrett.org/ > Furtherfield - http://www.furtherfield.org > DECAL - http://decal.is/ > Bio - https://marcgarrett.org/bio/ > CV - https://marcgarrett.org/cv/ <http://decal.is/> > <http://decal.is/> > > Sent with Proton Mail <https://proton.me/> secure email. > _______________________________________________ > NetBehaviour mailing list > NetBehaviour@lists.netbehaviour.org > https://lists.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour >
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