INTERNATIONAL RADIO CONFERENCE . Figure it Out : The Art of Living through System Failures

How do we abandon the current standard models of AI and tech services and advocate for inclusive technologies?

From December 13 to December 15, the arts organisation VEKTOR Athens presents the International Radio Conference “Figure it Out: The Art of Living through System Failures”, curated by Katerina Gkoutziouli. For three consecutive days, from 14.00 to 18.00 EET, artists, curators, activists, academics, researchers and technologists discuss their counter strategies and practices in the technological realm. Through three key areas, namely: Figure it Out: Art & Tech, Figure it Out: Environment & Tech and Figure it Out: Community & Tech, the radio conference reflects a growing realization that the current tech landscape is rife with disparities and shortcomings that need to be addressed.

Participants:
!Mediengruppe Bitnik, Tatiana Bazzichelli, James Bridle, Heath Bunting, Yuchen Chen, Kris De Decker, Daphne Dragona, Mara Ferreri, Anna Watkins Fisher, Kyriaki Goni, Valeria Graziano, Marinos Koutsomichalis, Alex Lu, Jonas Lund, Niels Plotard, RYBN.org & La Labomedia

The Conference is coordinated by Katerina Gkoutziouli, Co-founder – Director, VEKTOR Athens, and Yannis-Orestis Papadimitriou, Journalist.

The Radio Conference will be streamed via stegi.radio, the online radio station of Onassis Stegi and it will be relayed to the experimental platform Π-node.

All recordings (conversations & lectures) will be archived in the form of podcasts, after the end of the Conference. The podcasts will be available via stegi.radio, VEKTOR Athens website, Spotify and Mixcloud.

* The language of the conference is English.

Conference Schedule

Wednesday 13 December | 14.00 – 18.00 EET
“Figure it Out: Art & Tech”

The Figure it Out: Art & Tech session looks into the work of artists and curators who explore the intersection of artistic expression and technology. This session focuses on inspirational practices that are driving the development of our understanding of both art and tech. Through their work, they address societal issues, offering unique perspectives on subjects such as artificial intelligence, privacy in the digital age, deep fakes, and the human-machine connection in an extremely digitalized society.

14.00 – 14.40 | Refuse to be Human
with !Mediengruppe Bitnik, Artists (DE) – in conversation with Yannis-Orestis Papadimitriou, Journalist, Conference co-host (GR)

15.00 – 15.40 | The Allure of AI Spring: Unceasingly Training the Algorithm
with Kyriaki Goni, Artist (GR) – in conversation with Katerina Gkoutziouli, Founder – Director, VEKTOR Athens, Conference co-host (GR)

15:40 – 16:35 | The Human Touch – Sound intervention
Niels Plotard, Artist (Malta)

16.40 – 17.15 | Smile, You’re on Social Media
with Anna Watkins Fisher, Writer, Associate Professor of American Culture, University of Michigan (U.S.A.) – Lecture

17.20 – 18.00 | Unraveling Hierarchies in Algorithmic Societies
with Jonas Lund, Artist (SE) – in conversation with Katerina Gkoutziouli, Founder – Director, VEKTOR Athens, Conference co-host (GR)
 
Thursday, 14 December | 14.00 – 18.00 EET
“Figure it Out: Environment & Tech”

The Figure it Out: Environment & Tech session investigates the current status of the earth and its inhabitants in relation to the devastating exploitation of natural resources in the name of technological advancement. Having in mind the disproportional relation between the increase of computational power and environmental degradation, this session serves as a platform to highlight the urgency of environmental accountability in relation to the increase of technological endeavors by states and private companies worldwide. Thinking about the long-term health of our planet, the focus will be on how to steer technology in a direction that supports rather than compromises the very ecosystems upon which all forms of life depend.

14.00 – 14.40 | Survival Strategies in the Age of Climate Emergency
with Heath Bunting, Artist (UK) – in conversation with Katerina Gkoutziouli, Founder – Director, VEKTOR Athens, Conference co-host (GR)

15.00 – 16:00 | FIO • Canon In D Major Stretched
with Voltnoi Brege, Artist, Co-Artistic Director Stegi.radio, co-founder VEKTOR Athens (GR)

***Ways of Beings: Animals, Plants, Machines
with James Bridle, Artist, writer (UK/GR) – in conversation with Yannis-Orestis Papadimitriou, Journalist, Conference co-host (GR)
**James’s talk will be accessible exclusively through the conference archive.

16.00 – 16.40 | Tech for degrowth?
with Daphne Dragona, Curator, writer (GR/DE) – Lecture

17.00 – 17.40 | Reinventing technological progress
with Kris De Decker, Founder, Low-tech Magazine (ES/NL) – in conversation with Yannis-Orestis Papadimitriou, Journalist, Conference co-host (GR)

Friday 15 December | 14.00 – 18.00 EET
“Figure it Out: Community & Tech”

The Figure it Out: Community & Tech session delves into the status of unserved-by-technology communities working and living in precarious conditions worldwide. Looking into the inventiveness and resilience of communities, this session touches upon the algorithmic inequalities of certain groups and their exclusion from tech structures, exploring issues such as the ethics in the technological sector, whistleblowing, digital autonomy, and data security. Given the potential of technology to deepen divisions and injustices, this session encourages us to investigate the deeper-rooted problems, such as uneven power dynamics, cultural biases, and historical injustices that shape today’s technology landscape.

14.00 – 14.40 | Figure it Out: a political analysis of lying, stealing, and cheating
with Mara Ferreri, Assistant Professor of Geography, Polytechnic University of Turin (IT) and Valeria Graziano, Visiting Lecturer, Institute for Applied Theatre Studies, Justus Liebig University Giessen (IT/DE)

14:40 – 15.00 | Tell me your Recipe – On Techno-Disobedience (part 1) 
with Lisette and Reni, RYBN.ORG & La Labomedia

15.00 – 15.40 | Art as Evidence: When Art Meets Whistleblowing
with Tatiana Bazzichelli, Artistic Director, Founder, Disruption Network Lab (DE) – in conversation with Katerina Gkoutziouli, Founder – Director, VEKTOR Athens, Conference co-host (GR)

16.00 – 16.40 | China’s Xuexi App and the Digitalization of Good Citizenship
with Yuchen Chen and Alex Lu, Sociotechnical Scholars (U.S.A./CN) – in conversation with Yannis-Orestis Papadimitriou, Journalist, Conference co-host (GR)

17.00 – 17.40 | On the interplay between Care and Techno-solutionism
with Dr Marinos Koutsomichalis, Artist, Assistant Professor, Director, Media Arts and Design Research Lab, Cyprus University of Technology (CY/GR) – in conversation with Yannis-Orestis Papadimitriou, Journalist, Conference co-host (GR)

17:40 – 18.00 | Tell me your Recipe – On Techno-Disobedience (part 2) 
with Amy, Whispering Secret and Claire, RYBN.ORG & La Labomedia

Credits
Conference Curator: Katerina Gkoutziouli
Visual Identity: Oleg Suran
Communication: Maria Paktiti
Recording and post-production: Stefanos Konstantinidis – Fabrika Music Studio
Organised and produced by: VEKTOR Athens

The Conference is realized in the framework of the project FIO: the Art of Living through System Failures, which is financed under the Creative Europe Program (CREA-CULT-2022-COOP-1).

About the project

Figure it Out: The Art of Living Through System Failures explores practices and phenomena in which systems and institutions fail specific communities and populations. Trapped within constraining situations, these people are starting to develop strategies of lying, cheating and stealing to counter their limitations and powerlessness vis-à-vis these systems.

From the position of the dispossessed and excluded, actions and practices that would be condemned in the mainstream assume a different ethical and political connotation. In popular culture, these practices are frequently celebrated as a cunning and crafty reworking, often poetic or humorous. They have also expanded into the digital sphere as well, where they are getting recombined in interesting ways facing new kinds of algorithmic power structures. Figure it Out will explore the use of these practices as forms of resistance and tools for bypassing rules, as attempts to obtain access to key rights that remain foreclosed for certain groups. The aim is not to indiscriminately celebrate personal gain through illicit behavior, but to acknowledge the ingenuity that comes in finding a way out of an impossible situation. Possible examples come from a broad variety of practices – such as the avoidance of internet censorship by transformation of entire websites into image formats or the camouflage techniques of migrants adopting a ‘western’ look to fool surveillance algorithms.

The project will explore similar practices that enable disenfranchised groups to overcome barriers established by administrative and algorithmic regimes. The focus is on the strategies of rural women, eco-commoners, LGBTIQ+, migrants, etc. in conflict with corporate or state rules.

Figure it Out involves partners from Croatia, France, Greece, Malta and Serbia who will work with and engage different communities sharing their stories through art productions, exhibitions, a radio festival, bonfire events and web-zines.

Coordinator

Drugo More
→ www.drugo-more.hr

Participants

Kiosk (Belgrade, Serbia)
→ www.kioskngo.net

Labomedia (Orléans, France)
→ www.labomedia.org

Unfinished Foundation (Malta)
→ www.unfinishedartspace.org

VEKTOR (Athens, Greece)
→ www.vektorathens.org