Video-Performance

Project Description

This research-based desktop performance was produced in response to Nora Khan's text "Moving Past Eyelessness" which discusses "sight" as an unnecessary tool for machinic vision and dissects the ways in which machines collect, process, and analyze visual data. I collaborated with an AI chatbot in producing lyrics for a pop song by feeding lines of this text to the AI.

examining modes of eyelessness in machine learning, a screen recording of this collaboration makes multiple appearances throughout the performance. Structurally, the video starts with footage of eyeless robots including a tentacle arm and a security dog robot and then continues to introduce the AI-generated poetry as well as AR deep fakes videos of my face, screen recordings of specific targeted ads, and footage that are pertinent to the references in the text.

This performance occurred in conjunction with PDF-Objects Exhibition where “Participating artists are asked to submit a PDF of a text that significantly informs their practice, along with a description of a commonly available object (valued at $20 or less), and instructions on how to sculpturally embed the PDF and object together.” (http://pdf-objects.com/about/)

“Moving from the hypothetical to the virtual, Khoshooee materializes her PDF-OBJECT in cyberspace. The viewer is directed to feed a folded pink paper-strip of Nora Khan’s exhibition essay, “Moving Past Eyelessness,” an essay which addresses the machinic eye, into the HSTYAIG Money Saving Bank. The bank has two artificial eyes and a mechanical mouth that leads to a compartment. After feeding its face, viewers are instructed to read the PDF on their phone via a QR code. During her live Zoom performance, Khoshooee repeated this collaboration with the machine, where a video feed depicted Khan’s essay fed to Replika, an AI chatbot. This was done in tandem with a portrayal of AR deep-fake videos of the artist, which she does in protest against machinic face recognition.”[2]

[2] Text from New City Art, " Slouching Toward Equitable: PDF-OBJECTS Challenges Internet Hegemony", by Amanda Roach, June 5, 2020 7 AM, https://art.newcity.com/2020/06/05/pdf-objects-slouches-toward-a-more-equitable-internet/