Future Art Ecosystems 3: Art x Decentralised Tech Launch
Join us live on Twitch for a presentation of Future Art Ecosystems 3 (FAE3) – Serpentine Arts Technologies’ annual strategic briefing, and a participatory workshop led by RadicalxChange. How can we use decentralised technologies to build a more empowered cultural sector for supporting democratic societies?
On 25 November 2022, Serpentine’s Arts Technologies will release the third Future Art Ecosystem (FAE) briefing streamed publicly via Serpentine’s Twitch platform (@SerpentineUK).
Join us for a live presentation of FAE3 addressing the possibilities for a more interoperable (i.e. cross-organisationally integrated) vision for 21st century cultural infrastructure. FAE3 identifies new patterns for organisational and creative innovation within the broader space of decentralised technologies, variably dubbed as ‘web3’, ‘crypto’ and ‘dweb’. Through a series of interviews with specialists across art, web3, crypto, dweb, innovation policy and civic, the briefing articulates various horizons for reconfiguring how practitioners and the cultural sector at large can operationalise production, distribution and financial support systems. FAE3 formulates a series of prospective strategies for existing and new cultural organisations interested in AxAT and the latter’s role in supporting resilient democratic societies.
During the launch, our collaborators at RadicalxChange – a global movement for next-generation political economies – will lead a collective deliberation exercise with the help of pol.is, a digital platform that uses advanced statistics and machine learning to understand what large groups of people think, and illuminate areas of common ground and consensus across different opinion groups.
About Future Art Ecosystems
Future Art Ecosystems (FAE) was born out of a need to inform organisational development in the arts and specifically around ecosystem design for art and advanced technologies (AxAT). While there is a rich discursive space that revolves around art’s critical interventions into contemporary technologies such as AI, blockchain and immersive technologies, and their mainstream narratives, a dedicated focus on operational and infrastructural conditions for supporting and developing AxAT has been largely lacking.
Since 2019, FAE has united and platformed the voices of leading artists, technologists, cultural organisations and civic actors, whose efforts are directed towards building out new systems that can drive organisational and creative innovation.
About Pol.is workshop with RadicalxChange
Pol.is a digital platform for deliberations, which uses machine learning and advanced statistical methods to highlight the points of agreement and disagreement that exist within a community. In this exercise we will use pol.is to work with the question: “What are the steps we need to take to help bring about an interoperable cultural sector?“. Participants will be asked to write short statements in response to the question (anonymously), and evaluate each other’s statements. At the end, a report will be shared with the group, containing actionable insights that will help inform future collective action.
Important Information
To interact and submit questions online, you will need to create a Twitch account to join the conversation in real-time and take part. This is free and instructions can be found here. We hope to see you in the chat!
About the Speakers
Victoria Ivanova is R&D Strategic Lead. As a curator-strategist, she is focused on developing infrastructures for shaping socio-economic, political and institutional realities. Her practice-based PhD collaboration between Serpentine and The Centre for the Study of the Networked Image at the London South Bank University informed the prototyping of what are now Serpentine R&D Platform and Future Art Ecosystems.
Eva Jäger is Curator of Arts Technologies. She commissions artists working with advanced technologies and is a collaborator in teams designing novel approaches, workflows and philosophies of emerging tech. During her time at Serpentine she has worked with artists Jenna Sutela, Hito Steyerl, Suzanne Treister, Jakob Kudsk Steensen, Trust, 0rphan Drift, Kite, Keiken, Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley, Libby Heaney, Gabriel Massan and dmstfctn. Eva is also Co-Investigator of the Creative AI Lab (Serpentine R&D Platform and King’s College London).
Kay Watson is Head of Arts Technologies. She is a producer and curator working with art and advanced technologies, with a specialisation in building teams for full stack art commissions. She is also a Trustee of Brighton Photo Fringe, Mediale and The Photographers’ Gallery. She has led on Serpentine’s highly experimental and acclaimed arts technologies projects including Jakob Kudsk Steensen’s Augmented Architecture commission The Deep Listener in 2019.
Gary Zhexi Zhang is an artist whose work explores social infrastructures, technical histories and conceptual systems. He is Co-Writer of Future Art Ecosystems 3.
About Arts Technologies
Serpentine’s Arts Technologies at Serpentine proposes critical and interdisciplinary perspectives on advanced technologies through artistic interventions.
Supporting artist-led experimentation that challenges and reshapes the role that technologies can play in culture and society is at the heart of Arts Technologies’ commitment to Serpentine’s public mission. The programme supports artists in nurturing ambitious ideas and developing artworks that work with advanced technologies as a medium, tool or topic, often evolving iteratively and operating beyond gallery walls.
The foundation of the Arts Technologies programme is located in an evolving R&D Platform that supports the development of infrastructures for ongoing artistic exploration and interrogation of wider technological conditions within society.
About Future Art Ecosystems
Future Art Ecosystems (FAE) is an annual strategic briefing launched in 2020 that provides concepts, references, language and arguments that can be integrated into operational agendas for 21st century cultural infrastructure: the systems that support art and advanced technologies as a whole, and respond to a broader societal agenda.