ANNKA KULTYS GALLERY is pleased to present LAUREN Testimonials (2017) a film by Chinese-American artist and computer programmer Lauren Lee McCarthy. In addition to showcasing the single-channel video, the gallery is offering limited-edition A4 prints of film stills. This presentation is part of our new digital programme which will take place over the course of a year, and offer unique insights into new media artists using film, video animation, and digital media, as well as their latest technological explorations, including blockchain and advanced technologies such as AI. Our goal is to contextualise their work within historical digital art themes and promote their practices to both our digital and traditional art collectors.
LAUREN Testimonials (2017) is a film of the LAUREN interactive performance piece by McCarthy in which the artist attempts to become a human intelligent version of the AI virtual assistants like Alexa or Siri. The artist says, “I’m trying to highlight this trade we are making for these surveillance smart devices.” LAUREN re-imagines the AI assistant by asking what if a real person was behind our smart devices, rather than a system trained on datasets with their inherent biases and programmed by a small group of developers with a commercial agenda? The artist comes to this task with her own knowledge, values, and baggage - with LAUREN you get the flaws and anomalies of a real person. It is the embodiment of something usually unseen and unknown.
Participants welcome her into their homes for a three-day performance and LAUREN watches over them 24/7, via installed smart devices that control cameras, sensors and switches. Communicating via a synthesized voice based on the artist’s own, she becomes intimately involved in the participants home life, learning their behaviour and anticipating their needs. As LAUREN, McCarthy attempts to be better than an AI – we hear from a participant - “It’s like a friend,” however, another says “I don’t really like the idea of her being in control.”
LAUREN critiques the way we are taught to interact with algorithms and how reliant we have become on technology that is now built into almost every aspect of life. The wide-angle lens used for filming gives an unsettling feel – a CCTV, panning the room. McCarthy encourages us to consider boundaries, notions of agency and privacy in a time of surveillance and mass data collection. LAUREN exists in a created space outside the studio, beyond the gallery. Interactive, participatory projects in art began in the late 1960s where artist and audience each relinquished some control to create the art. Allowing the audience to be a part of the art making process gives the art an increased relevance and the artist an increased power.
Through LAUREN viewers are gifted a space to form their own opinions - the artwork allows a glimpse into the gap between machine-driven AI and the human mind. LAUREN is a contemplation on what is means to be human in an age of digitality.
Visit the gallery website to watch the video: https://www.annkakultys.com/moving-image/
The online programme will feature weekly launches on Sundays over the course of 12 months. The first four artists to be showcased are: Jonas Lund (17 November 2024), Sara Sadik (24 November 2024), Oliver Laric (1 December 2024) and Lauren Lee McCarthy (8 December 2024).
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For all sales enquiries, please contact Annka Kultys at +44 74 555 61 887 (WhatsApp) or at [email protected] (email)
