Workshop directed by: Portrait XO

Digital data is omnipresent − but who owns it? While large corporations exploit data commercially, the question arises as to how it can also be used for the common good, for artistic practice and as a means of amplifying underrepresented voices. Artists are increasingly using data as a material, source of inspiration and medium to reflect on social issues and create new forms of expression. But what ethical challenges and opportunities does this present?

In an open call, BLAUES RAUSCHEN has selected interested parties from various fields of art and design, music, sound art, performance, literature, digital arts, research and programming to actively participate.

For three days, this “group of strangers” will develop a 20-minute performance at this year’s workshop under the direction of Portrait XO, which will deal with the self-determination of digital data and its potential for collective expression. It is not only about ethical questions, but also about new artistic strategies: How can data be used as a collaborative tool? What creative forms of expression can emerge from it? How can it be used to strengthen voices that would otherwise go unheard? And how are we touched by this representation? An experiment.

About the artist:

Portrait XO is a multimodal artist and independent researcher. She developed her audiovisual AI art partly in a project at the NEW NOW FESTIVAL. Portrait XO also contributes to fostering the community of hybrid artists exploring computational creativity and human-machine collaboration as the founder of SOUND OBSESSED.

As a live performer at BLAUES RAUSCHEN, Portrait XO will also present her project The Cost of Connection − an audiovisual performance with sonified data from the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals.