PUBLICATIONS 2021-2023

• Elizabeth Stephens, ‘The Mechanical Turk: A Short History of “Artificial Artificial Intelligence”’ Cultural Studies (2022): 65- 87
• Sarah Collins, “The Operatic Roots of Performativity: Bodies Decontextualised in Butler, Brecht, and Busoni”, Cambridge Opera Journal (2022), 1-29.
• Ionat Zurr, “Outsourcing Care for Life”, in Arc-hive: Case Studies and Life as an Object, ed. by Ena Hodžić, Olga Majcen Linn, Jurica Mlinarec, and Luja Šimunović (Kontejner, 2022)
• Oron Catts, “Post-promethean Art”, in Arc-hive: Case Studies and Life as an Object. ed. by Ena Hodžić, Olga Majcen Linn, Jurica Mlinarec, and Luja Šimunović (Kontejner, 2022)
• Sarah Collins, “On or about 1932: The Mechanical Reproduction of the Middlebrow”, in The Oxford Handbook of Music and the Middlebrow, eds Kate Guthrie and Chris Chowrimootoo (Oxford University Press, 2023)
• Ionat Zurr & Oron Catts, Tissues, Cultures, Art (Palgrave Macmillan, 2023)
• Oron Catts & Ionat Zurr, “Thermopolitics”, in Viral Cultures, as part of the series Biotechne: Interthinking Art, Science and Design (series editors: Charissa Terranova and Meredith Tromble) Bloomsbury Press, forthcoming.
• Sarah Collins, ‘Stone as Witness: Mute Speech, Don Juan and the Ear of the Future’, Angelaki: Journal of the Theoretical Humanities 28.4 (2023): 29-44.

EXHIBITIONS

• Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr, in collaboration with Steven Berrick, ‘Sunlight, Soil & Shit (De)Cycle’, PS Gallery, Fremantle, 5-26 Feb, 2022

PROJECT EVENTS

• “Life in the Age of Automation: Cultural and Creative Perspectives”, Study Day, 26 Sept., 2022, UQ, Brisbane. Hosted by Elizabeth Stephens and the Digital Cultures and Society Hub (UQ)

Partners:

• ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making and Society (ADM+S) admscentre.org.au
• Digital Cultures and Society Hub (UQ) LINK
• ARC “The Cultural and Intellectual History of Automated Labour” (UWA/UQ) automationcultures.com
• ARC DP “The Geopolitics of Automation” (WSU) LINK

“The Art and Science of Synthetic Biology”, LASER talk, Institute of Modern Art, 27 Sept.
2022 Brisbane. Speakers: Oron Catts, Ionat Zurr, and Jestin George. Hosted by Elizabeth Stephens and Grayson Cooke.

“Automation Culture” Seminar Series, UWA and online:  

• Shintaro Miyazaki (Humboldt-Universitat zu Berlin, Media Studies and Computation), “Counter-Algorhythmics as Prefigurative Dances of Commonism”, 9 Dec. 2022
• Ned Rossiter (WSU, Media Studies), “Automated Dreams”, 21 Oct, 2022
• Chris Danta (UNSW, Literary Studies), “Dear AI Reader: Nonhuman Perspective and Evolutionary Thinking in the Human-Machine Relation”, Sept. 2022
• Warren Mansell (Curtin, Psychology and Population Health), “The Automation of Life: Engineering Negative Feedback Control”, 29 July 2022
• Orkan Telhan (UPenn), “Automation and Istanbul’s Public Gardens”, 17 Dec. 2021
• Pia van Gelder (ANU), “Automation or Divination: David Tudor and the Instrument of his Instruments”, Nov. 2021
• Sean Dockray (ANU), “Falling”, Nov. 2021
• Gunalan Nadarajan, “Dressing Animals, Governing Files, Managing Traffic: Habits of Automation”, 22 Oct 2021
• Paul Vanouse, “Labor, Bodies, Nonhumans & Identity”, 26 Aug 2021

KEYNOTE LECTURES GIVEN BY PROJECT TEAM

• Ionat Zurr, Monster Conference, Limina Journal in collaboration with the ARC Centre for the History of Emotions and the Classics Department at the University of Reading UK, 9/9/2022
• Ionat Zurr, m/other becomings symposium.  Aalto University  9/6/2022
• Elizabeth Stephens: Transparent Women: The Visual Cultures of Medicine ANU. 9/11/2022
• Oron Catts, Robots as Surrogate to Biological Functions, in Creative Collaborations #2 Art, Design & HRI. Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, and the Bezalel Academy for Arts and Design, Jerusalem 12/05/2022
• Oron Catts, “Frankenstein’s Reproducibility Crisis”, in Quantum Words Perth, WA State Library, 17/09/2022

CONFERENCE PRESENTATIONS

Panel on “Automating Life: Cultural and Creative Perspectives”, Cultural Studies Association of Australasia conference, 2 Dec, 2022, Melbourne. Convened by Elizabeth Stephens.

Papers Presented:

• Sergio Santiago Renteria Aguila, “Machine Listening Aesthetics: Reanimating Sonic Ecologies”
• Elizabeth Stephens, “Automaton and the Invention of “Life””
• Ionat Zurr, “Who Cares? Michael Richardson (respondent): “Nonhuman Witnessing of Automated Life”

Panel on “Automating Life”, in “Life in the Age of Automation: Cultural and Creative Perspectives”, Study Day, 26 Sept., 2022, UQ, Brisbane

Papers Presented:

• Elizabeth Stephens, ‘“Fauxtomation” and Programmable Life”
• Oron Catts, “Art as a Precursor to MetabolicRift Technologies”
• Ionat Zurr, “The Revitalisation of Automation”
• Sarah Collins, “Automation as Mimesis”

Other Presentations:

• Oron Catts, Sarah Collins, Elizabeth Stephens, Ionat Zurr, “Neutralising Nature: Automation, Agricultural Technologies, and the Morality of Improvement”, IEEE International Symposium on Technology and Society (ISTAS), 28-31 Oct. 2021, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada (virtual)
• Tarsh Bates, Oron Catts, Sarah Collins, Dale Tilbrook, Ionat Zurr, “Automation Cultures Digestion: Panel”, 3SDC Contestable Food Systems Symposium, Seedbox Community Garden event, 10 Feb. 2022
• Ionat Zurr, “Life as an Object”, Kersnikova Creative Europe project Arc-hive  (17/02/2022)
• Ionat Zurr, American Communities program presents: Bioart & Resistence: A Global Virtual Roundtable, Cal State LA USA (16/3/2022)
• Ionat Zurr: Laser Talk – Beyond Spontaneous Generation – an art & science encounter
• Sarah Collins, “Belonging as Mimetic Contagion”, Australian Academy of Humanities Symposium, Ballarat, Nov 2022
• Sarah Collins, “The Stone Guest”, American Musicological Society Conference, New Orleans, Nov 2022
• Sarah Collins, “The Future of AI”, French Dialogues, Hosted by UWA Law, Perth City Council Library, Sept 2022
• Sarah Collins, “Animating the Inanimate: musical automation on stage and screen”, Creative Arts Research Institute, Griffith University, Brisbane, Oct. 4, 2022
• Sarah Collins, “Sounding Simulacra: The Aesthetics of Automation in Opera and Animation”, Royal Holloway, University of London, 2022
• Sarah Collins, “Papageno on the Assembly Line”, American Musicological Society Conference, Nov 2021
• Oron Catts, “Life as an Object”. Kersnikova Creative Europe project Arc-hive (17/02/2022)
• Oron Catts, “Post Promethean Art” @ JRC-EC [artist talk] Talk at the Joint Research Centre, European Commission, Organised by the JRC SciArt project 24/05/2022
• Oron Catts, “Nature free (Agri)culture – Hacking and Contesting Future Food Systems” in HACKERS, MAKERS, THINKERS, Collective Experiments in Social Fermenting, Berlin University of the Arts and Art Laboratory Berlin 27/05/2022
• Oron Catts The European Commission Joint Research Centre Science Summit 2022, “Ethical challenges of a future world shaped by emerging technologies” (Block: Needs for Science in the Future) 14/06/2022
• Oron Catts, Imagining a New Policy Agenda for Australian Arts & Culture, The University of Western Australia’s Public Policy Institute, WA State Library 06/10/2022
• Oron Catts, Metabolic Rift Technologies at RIXC Art Science Festival and Renewable Futures Conference 2022: SPLINTERED REALITIES, Riga, Latvia 08/10/2022
• Oron Catts, Nonconsensual Artwashing, in Navigating Ethics in Arts Partnerships (The Summit), the Chamber of Arts and Culture (WA), 25/10/2022

AFFILIATED POSTGRADUATE PROJECTS

• Sergio Santiago Rentería Aguilar, “Machine Listening: Reanimating Acoustic Ecologies”, PhD candidate, UWA
  • S. Rentería. ‘The Song Remains the Same: Normative Listening in the Nómos of Birds and Computers’. Murdoch University Philosophy Seminar. Australia 2023.
  • S. Rentería. ‘Spectral (De)compositions: Dadamining Datamining. NONSTOP WKND: Planetary Auditions’. Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. Australia 2023.
  • S. Rentería. ‘The Aesthetics of Machine Listening: Reanimating Sonic Ecologies’. CTM 2023: Research Networking Day – Future Scenarios of Non-human Sound. Germany 2023.
  • S. Rentería. ‘The Silence of Avian Archives: A Practice-led Study of Machine Listening’. Panel: Zoömusicology: The Music of Nature and the Nature of Music 45th National Conference of the Musicological Society of Australia 2022. Co-panelists: Hollis Taylor, Solomon Frank, Eleanor Brimblecombe.

• David Friedrich, “Phenomenology of Bionic Sensation. Rethinking the relationship between sound and hearing based on the cochlear implant”, PhD candidate, UWA
  • 24th Annual Western University Graduate Symposium on Music (WUGSOM). “Not without my discipline: Adding techno-philosophy to the multidisciplinary nature of the cochlear implant.” London / Canada.  Aug. 25–26, 2023.
  • 11th International Scientific Meeting for Sound, Music and Musical Instrument Studies. “Let’s talk about the Cochlear Implant and its impact on our understanding of sound.” Coimbra / Portugal.  July 21-24, 2023.
  • Arts and Humanities in Digital Transition. “Beyond Biology: The Impact of Neurotechnology on Human Sensory Experience“. NOVA FCSH (Lisbon / Portugal). July 6–7, 2023.
  • NOVA Contemporary Music Meeting. “Beyond Acoustics: The Impact of Cochlear Implants on Sound Perception“. NOVA. FCSH (Lisbon / Portugal). May 3-5, 2023.
  • Conservatorium of Music. “Hearing like a hammerhead shark? How a techno-philosophical investigation of the cochlear implant alters our understanding of sound perception.“ UWA (Perth / Australia). March 28, 2023.
  • Media and Communication Research Seminar. “The Cochlear Implant: A Media Theory about its Influence on Human Sensory Experience“. UWA School of Social Sciences (Australia). February 10, 2023.
  • Medien, die wir meinen [Media in our sense]. “Let’s talk about the technológos of the cochlear implant“. [via Zoom]. Berlin (Germany). February 8, 2023.
  • Musicological Society of Australia. Western Australia Chapter Conference. “There is no Natural Hearing“. UWA Conservatorium of Music (Australia). November 28, 2022.
  • EMSD Forum. “Live. Recording. Sound— A (personal) Journey to our understanding of sound“. UWA Conservatorium of Music (Australia). August 3, 2022.

Podcasts:

• • “Das Ende der Menschheit ist die bessere Realität.” [The End of Humanity is the Better Reality]. Zerteilte Zukünfte (Podcast). Released on May 08, 2023. https://podcasts.apple.com/de/podcast/322-das-ende-der-menschheit-ist-die-bessere-realit%C3%A4t/id1609852611?i=1000612098865.
  • “Musik-KI klont Drake & The Weeknd [Heart On My Sleeve].” [Music AI Clone Drake & The Weeknd]. Zerteilte Zukünfte (Podcast). Released on April 23, 2023. https://podcasts.apple.com/de/podcast/320-musik-ki-klont-drake-the-weeknd-heart-on-my-sleeve/id1609852611?i=1000610283559.
  • “Neuro-Biotechnologie mit David Friedrich.” [Neuro Biotechnology with David Friedrich]. Zerteilte Zukünfte (Podcast). Released on Sep. 4, 2022. https://podcasts.apple.com/de/podcast/211-neuro-biotechnologie-mit-david-friedrich/id1609852611?i=1000578283703