Justine Emard – Supraorganism
Hours and dates
- From Oct 27 to Oct 30 from 10:00 to 18:00
The place
Cinex
Language
All
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AboutJustine Emard
Justine Emard, a French artist, explores the new relationship between our lives and technology.
By combining different image media – from photography to video and virtual reality – she situates her work at the crossroads between neuroscience, objects, organic life and artificial intelligence. Her devices take as their starting point experiments in deep learning and dialogue between human and machine. Since 2016, she has been collaborating with scientific laboratories in Japan. She is a laureate of the French Institute’s 2017 Hors-les-murs residency in Tokyo.
Her work has been exhibited at the Moscow International Biennial of Contemporary Art and in museums such as NRW Forum (Düsseldorf), National Museum of Singapore, Moscow Museum of Modern Art, Itaú Cultural Institute (São Paulo), Cinémathèque Québécoise (Montreal), Irish Museum of Modern Art (Dublin), Mori Art Museum (Tokyo), MOT Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, Barbican Center (London) and the World Museum (Liverpool).
In 2020, she is in residence at the ZKM, Centre for Art and Media Karlsruhe, and is the winner of the national photographic commission “IMAGE 3.0” of the Centre national des arts plastiques (CNAP) in partnership with the Jeu de Paume in Paris. In 2021-22, she is a guest artist-professor at Le Fresnoy, Studio national des arts contemporains.
KIKK in townSupraorganism
Supraorganism is a reactive installation composed of robotic glass sculptures, animated by a machine learning system (artificial intelligence), and developed from data collected in a community of bees.
As guardians of the balance between earth and sky, bees have always been a source of inspiration for thinkers. The observation of their intelligence is an indicator of the state of our ecosystem and they are often called upon to think about the present.
Today, machine deduction techniques allow us to interpret a large amount of data and to observe the world differently. Supraorganism is a work about the memory of bees and their collective intelligence. The creation process is calculated from observed behaviour patterns and analysed by computer. An artificial neural network has been trained on the data captured by the artist. This machine learning system, developed specifically for the project, generates predictions: a glimpse of possible futures.
These predictive interstices are embodied in a visual and sound installation. Some twenty robotic glass sculptures, suspended on a stainless steel structure, are deployed in the space. The modules come to life through their connected systems, lights and motors, animated by live artificial intelligence. The generated light and sound immerse us in this predictive atmosphere. Thanks to its ambient sensors, the installation reacts in a subtle way to the detection of visitors and adapts to their presence, like an artificial life organism.
The non-predictable nature of the system leads us to a singular experience. The light and sound of this new organised being react in symbiosis while surprising each other, colliding in a structured, organic and floating constellation. From this ensemble emanates a form of collective intelligence: a supra-organism comes to life, itself generating new images from the shadows and reflections projected in the space-time of the installation.
