A City Beyond
WE ARE AIA - Löwenbräukunst, Zurich, SwitzerlandCurator: Martina Huber & Violeta Burckhardt
Artists: Studio Eidola, Superflex & Alex Jordan, Marc Lee, Pedro Wirz, Isabell Bullerschen, Architecture for Refugees, Mira Hirtz
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CAON — Control and Optimize Nature @ A City Beyond, WE ARE AIA, Zurich
Mobile app as interface for two-channel real-time processed interactive installation
Imagining a speculative future in which technological solutionism has been taken to an extreme, CAON explores the potential of advanced technologies in the management of future ecosystems. In a habitat where animal, fungi, and plant species have been modified by 3D printing, CRISPR, and synthetic biology, the viewer observes an artificial intelligence (AI) preventing the delicate ecosystem from collapsing. The audience is invited to fly with the created species, interacting with a smartphone through the perspective of an AI simulator, to optimize the living beings further, and observe the changing ecosystem.
These developments are not merely speculative, but are happening today. Research published by Evans et al. in 2019 shows that many offspring of genetically modified mosquitoes have survived and are spreading and propagating further. Where is our growing ability to manipulate life taking us? We tend to rely on technology-based solutions such as genetic engineering, synthetic biology, and AI, which usually have their own human-oriented benefits and are often assisted by our misguided instinct to control and optimize nature.
CAON responds to the trend of technology-assisted solution-making by constructing narratives of an incomputable system under extreme control. The project aims to interrogate our tendency to simplify complex ecosystems by treating nature as a system that can be fixed.
Supported by a residency at transmediale studio in Berlin and a research residency in Pakistan in collaboration with Pro Helvetia.
Exhibited Artwork
CAON - control and optimize nature
Mobile App as Interface for Interactive InstallationsImagining a speculative future where technological solutionism has been taken to an extreme, CAON - control and optimize nature explores the potential of advanced technologies in the management of future ecosystems. In a habitat where animal, fungi, and plant species have been modified by technologies such as 3D printing, CRISPR and synthetic biology, you can observe how an AI optimizes and balances more …
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