Organized by Chris Salter, Alex Saunier, Takashi Ikegami, Sofian Audry, David Howes.
With the support of the Fond de Recherche Société et Culture du Québec.
| Time (EDT) | Title |
|---|---|
| 17:30-17:45 | Introduction by the organizers (Alex Saunier, Cris Salter, Joseph Thibodeau |
| 17:45-18:05 | Totem (Chris Salter, David Howes) |
| 18:05-18:20 | Tickle Salon (Erwin Driessens & Maria Verstappen) |
| 18:20-18:40 | Offloaded mind (Takashi Ikegami) |
| 18:40-18:50 | Break |
| 18:50-19:05 | Sustainable open endedness in coevolving artworks (Stephen Kelly) |
| 19:05-19:20 | Evolving moving visual illusions from neural networks (Lana Sinapayen) |
| 19:20-19:40 | Refining the metaphors (Sofian Audry, Joseph Thibodeau) |
| 19:40-19:50 | Break |
| 19:50-20:25 | Discussion |
| 20:25-20:30 | Closing remarks |
The workshop revolves around 3 thematics and consist in presenting works, discussing them and brainstorming ideas collectively. Each section will be followed by a short break.
As ALife gets out of computer screens and is staged into the material world, how does it develop a sense of its environment and how is it perceived by spectators?
What are the necessary ingredients that catalyze meaningful engagements with ALife machines and enable humans to infuse them with a sense of being and mind?
As AI and ALife exhibit novel forms of machinic agency and creativity, do practitioners develop a sense of "creating with" machines and how do they perceive this relation of "co-production"?
This workshop explores the use of A-Life techniques in an area of growing research and creation practice: the new conception and design of complex interactive machines/ media environments.
While techniques associated with A-Life ranging from cellular automata to genetic algorithms and complex systems have long been used in artistic practices with new technologies (Penny 2010; Dorin 2015), earlier generation of artists working in the 1990s focused on the area of screen-based simulation (Shanken 1998; Helmreich 2016). Now, some thirty years later, the digital based arts become interested in more ecological, embodied and dynamic approaches to perception and experience. They increasingly incorporate biological and machinic systems in interaction with each other in the real physical world (as opposed to simulations). In this context, A-Life’s research in the topics of open-ended evolution, emergence, agency and complex dynamics make for a powerful set of tools and techniques to be deployed by creators.
This is especially important as artificial intelligence in the guise of machine learning seems to be taking over artistic practice using new digital technologies, particularly through the use of Generative Adversarial Networks to generate “AI artworks.” But the limitations of many ML and deep learning techniques are already clear: they are difficult to use in real time due to the massive amounts of offline training required, pattern generation techniques are not particularly rich (as opposed to pattern analysis) and ML’s and deep learning’s focus on optimization over temporal evolution seems opposed to the open-ended and exploratory tradition of artistic practices with machines. So it is time for discussing and fostering ALIFE as a post-AI tools and concepts.
The workshop will consist of discussions with the core investigators who come from Quebec, France, the US and Japan and form an interdisciplinary team from physics and complex systems (Ikegami), machine learning (Audry), the digital arts (Salter, Saunier) and Sensory Anthropology (Howes). The workshop will introduce interdisciplinary perspectives around how A-Life techniques can be used to create rich temporal dynamics in media systems and offer the participants hands on experience working with several techniques being applied in the project. Also this highly interdisciplinary workshop emerges from a currently funded Quebec Research Council for the Social Sciences and Humanities research project called “Dynamic Light” (FRQSC) which explores the generation and experience of complex temporal dynamics in large scale lighting systems used in the arts and entertainment industries.
The workshop will be held as a satellite event at the Milieux Institute for Arts, Culture and Technology at Concordia University in Montreal, one of the largest interdisciplinary centers for research-creation in art, media technology, design and digital culture in North America.
Chris Salter is an artist, Full Professor for Design + Computation Arts at Concordia University in Montreal and Director of the Hexagram Concordia Centre for Research- Creation in Media Arts and Technology. He studied philosophy, economics, theatre and computer music at Emory and Stanford Universities. After collaborating with Peter Sellars and William Forsythe/Ballett Frankfurt, he co-founded and directed the art and research organization Sponge (1997-2003). His solo and collaborative work has been seen all over the world at such venues as the Venice Architecture Biennale, Ars Electronica, Barbican Centre, Berliner Festspiele, Wiener Festwochen, Musée d’art Contemporain, LLUM BCN 2020, PACT Zollverein, Villette Numerique, EMPAC, Transmediale, EXIT Festival and Place des Arts, among many others. He is the author of Entangled: Technology and the Transformation of Performance (MIT Press, 2010) and Alien Agency: Experimental Encounters with Art in the Making (MIT Press 2015). His new book on human and machine sensing will be published by MIT Press in 2021.
Alex Saunier is a Paris and Montreal based interdisciplinary creator and doctoral student. He specializes in physical computing technologies, through which he associates both computer and physical systems, challenges our perception of digital machines, and seeks sensible links with abstract processes. Alexandre’s PhD project focuses on live light performance. In developing and experimenting with light instruments he explores the bidirectional relation between humans and machines. Questioning the way technology reshapes us as we create it is central to Alexandre’s work. He holds a masters degree in sound engineering from the ENS Louis Lumière (France) and participated in research projects on interactive light systems and behavioral objects at the ENS Arts Décoratifs (France). His artistic work has been exhibited in several French festivals and exhibitions. He also conducts workshops in various contexts, including the Conference on Tangible, Embedded and Embodied Interaction ’14 in Munich.
Takashi Ikegami is a professor in the Department of General Systems Sciences at the University of Tokyo. His works encompasses both the arts and sciences and deal with complex systems and artificial life. He received his doctorate in physics from the University of Tokyo. His research is centered on complex systems and artificial life, e.g. studies of chemical oil droplets, machine consciousness by building Mind TimeMachine, the android Alter3 and so on.. Takashi Ikegami frequently attends the International Conference on Artificial Life, and gave the keynote address at the 20th Anniversary of Artificial Life conference in Winchester, UK. He also hosted ALIFE2018 in Tokyo. He is a member of the editorial boards of Artificial Life, Adaptive Behavior and BioSystems.
David Howes is Professor of Anthropology, Co-Director of the Centre for Sensory Studies, and Director of the Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies in Society and Culture at Concordia University, Montreal, Canada. He holds three degrees in anthropology and two degrees in law. His main fields of research include sensory anthropology, multisensory aesthetics, culture and consumption, constitutional studies, and the anthropology of law. He has conducted field research on the cultural life of the senses in the Middle Sepik River region of Papua New Guinea, Northwestern Argentina, and the Southwestern United States. He is currently collaborating with new media artist Christopher Salter on a project called “Mediations of Sensation.” His latest publications include “Ways of Sensing: Understanding the Senses in Society” (co-authored with Constance Classen) and the edited collection “A Cultural History of the Senses in the Modern Age, 1920–2000.”
Sofian Audry studied computer science and mathematics at University of Montreal, where he completed a master in machine learning; following which he obtained a master in communication at UQÀM. His PhD is in Humanities from Concordia University. He creates computational artistic works through different forms such as robotics, interactive installations, immersive environments, physical computing interventions, internet art, and electronic literature. His work is inspired from visual art, artificial intelligence, artificial life, biology and cognitive sciences. He is an artist and Assistant Professor of New Media at the University of Quebec at Montreal (UQAM). His interdisciplinary practice and research is at the crossroad between artificial intelligence and contemporary new media art. Audry works to develop new artistic practices employing artificial agents and behaviors, to design new tools for new media creators, and to critically engage with the theoretical, and historical dimensions of AI. His work and research have been presented at multiple international events and venues such as Ars Electronica, Club Transmediale, Dutch Design Week, International Digital Arts Biennale, ISEA, La Gaîté Lyrique, Marrakech Biennale, Nuit Blanche Paris, SAT, V2, and the Vitra Design Museum.