Next Thursday May 23, Mieres’ Center of Art Experiences Pozu Santa Bárbara (Asturias) opens a new audiovisual installation created by Italian art studio fuse*. This work, entitled Onirica (), promoted by Cultural Department of Mieres’ Town Council, uses artificial intelligence to convert the dreams of thousands of persons into moving images.
Pozu Santa Bárbara (PZSB) is the first Asturian mine shaft declared as a protected heritage of the first order, as it has been listed as an Asset of Cultural Interest (BIC) since 2008. Located at La Rebaldana, Turón, in the Council of Mieres, refurbishment works started in 2021 to turn the mine shaft into a reference site for contemporary art interventions, hosting the works of such important local and international artists as Anthony McCall, Herminio, Regine Schumann and, more recently and curated by L.E.V., Andy Thomas and his project Visual Bird Sounds.
Now, curated by L.E.V. (Laboratorio de Electrónica Visual), PZSB presents the latest project by Italian art studio fuse*: Onirica (). This audiovisual work explores the dimension of dreams, using synthetic languages to portray the creative capabilities of the human mind while sleeping. By using algorithms able to translate texts into images, the installation transforms our night tales into something visible, posing new questions about the relationship between the human being and the machine, between the creator and the tool.
The work transforms into a collective experience the dreams of the volunteers that took part in the research sessions in the Universities of Bologna and California Santa Cruz. The stories of this piece, selected from a pool of 28 748 dreams, flow one into the other as a series of short films, portraying the real cadence of dreams throughout the night in their different REM and NREM phases. The visual sequences are artificially generated by a machine learning system which translates the dream descriptions into a series of subsequent visual hallucinations bringing life to the characters, objects and landscapes shown here.
This continuous flux of synthetic conscience finds its final aesthetic through the close collaboration between human beings and the artificial intelligence: despite the machine offers infinite possible translations of the stories into images and voices, it cannot make conceptual and aesthetic decisions. Therefore, technology plays the role of a creative assistant which translates the indications of a director, offering possible ideas and solutions. A relationship similar to what we could find in a film team, but in this case composed by humans and intelligent machines.
The audiovisual installation Onirica () stresses the tension created by the interpretation and translation of a purely human experience, the dream, through the eyes of the new technologies. Placing itself in an increasingly relevant ethical debate, this work aims to approach the relationship between a strictly human sensibility and the creative capabilities of artificial intelligence systems from an unprecedented and exploratory point of view, trying to reveal its possibilities and limitations, and to force the viewer to think in a conscious and critical way about the possible impact of these technologies in our society and in our perception of ourselves.
The exhibition will encompass the entire space of the old Compressor Room of Pozu Santa Bárbara and will include exclusive, never shown elements in addition to the immersive installation: in particular, a series of prints on plexiglass and an interactive screen where visitors will be able to explore the dream banks on which the work is based.
About fuse*
fuse* is a multidisciplinary art studio which researches the expressive possibilities of emergent technologies, aiming to understand the complexities of human, social and natural phenomena. From the beginning, the studio’s investigations have aimed to create multimedia installations and performances to explore the limits between several disciplines, and to find new connections among light, space, sound and movement.
Managed by its founders Luca Camellini and Mattia Carretti, the studio has been evolving throughout the years, and now it deals with the creation of new projects with an increasingly holistic approach, using a modus operandi focused on pure experimentation and collective creativity. Their aim is to create works able to inspire, to put the ordinary on stand-by, and to stimulate reflection, sensibility and imagination. Since 2016, fuse* has coproduced the electronic music and digital art festival NODE, and shown their works internationally at art institutions and festival such as Mutek, TodaysArt, Sónar, Artechouse, China National Museum, STRP Biennial, RomaEuropa, Kikk, Scopitone, INOTA Festival, Hong Kong Design Institute, Dongdaemun Design Plaza, Marignana Arte, CUBO, Videocittà, Fondazione Alberto Peruzzo, and Palazzo Cipolla.
Useful information
Pozu Santa Bárbara, La Rebaldana, Turón (Mieres, Asturies)
www.mieres.es
From May 23 to July 28
Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays from 16:30 to 21:00 h. Saturdays, Sundays and holidays, from 11:00 to 14:00 h. and from 16:30 to 21:00 h.
Free entrance
Arranged by: Cultural Department of Mieres’ Town Council
Curated by: L.E.V. Laboratorio de Electrónica Visual
