7x7 2024 draws together creative pairings from across disciplines to consider how AI may alter our understanding of love, humor, and improvisation; biology, politics, and histories. Among these collaborative projects, 7x7 2024 will feature an experimental performance created with Boston Dynamics' Spot® The Agile Mobile Robot.
The 7x7 2024 participants and their topics are:- Quantum physicist Dr. Stephon Alexander and comedian and musician Reggie Watts experiment with improvisation as a way to understand connections among physics, creativity, and AI.
- Boston Dynamics Director of Human-Robot Interaction David Robert and artist Miriam Simun explore connection between humans and non-humans through a performance featuring Spot® - The Agile Mobile Robot, with support from Field Application Specialist Hannah Rossi.
- Runway Co-Founder and CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela and comedian, writer, and actor Ana Fabrega ask if AI can be funny, on the heels of the recent Writers Guild of America agreement with major Hollywood studios that ratified worker protections around AI.
- Replika AI Founder and CEO Eugenia Kuyda and artist Lynn Hershman Leeson collaborate on a science-fiction narrative in which AI relationships play a central role.
- Nym Technologies Co-Founder and CEO Harry Halpin and artist Tomás Saraceno consider technology's role in organizational decision-making for communities facing climate-related conflict and upheaval.
- Ginkgo Bioworks Head of Creative Christina Agapakis and artist Xin Liu embark on a journey of creating a protein and delve into the hidden layers of the biological system that AI might uncover.
- Engineer and environmental entrepreneur Alan Steremberg and artist Rindon Johnson use data for storytelling, drawing on information about plastics, plankton, and other conditions in the Pacific Ocean.
"Neural networks and other AI systems have long been topics of note at 7x7. With these technologies now widely available, 7x7 2024 takes an expansive but critical view of their role in society," notes Rhizome Co-Executive Director Michael Connor. "The participants look beyond the dreams of apocalypse and the endless drive to extract, and ask, what new kinds of collaborations and entanglements will AI enable?" Since its inception in 2010, 7x7 has been a catalyst in the evolution of art and technology collaboration, often acting as a mirror of significant cultural contexts and an indicator of emerging trends in our increasingly technological society. The site of the creation of the first NFT by artist Kevin McCoy and technologist Anil Dash in 2014, 7x7 has catalyzed some of the earliest creative experimentations and critical engagements with machine learning, blockchain, and social media technologies. Past participants include Ai Weiwei, American Artist, Alex Chung, Miranda July, David Karp, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Trevor McFedries, Jonah Peretti, Aza Raskin, Tabita Rezaire, Hito Steyerl, Martine Syms, and Meredith Whittaker, to name a few. |
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