How can we create anti-colonial approaches to AI?
How can ‘slow’ principles help us arrive at better ways of designing, deploying and engaging with the technology across different fields?
What can a Slow AI become?
We are excited to share with you the launch of “Slow AI,” a collaboration between the Visual Methodologies Collective at Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences and the Algorithmic Cultures Research Group at Gerrit Rietveld Academie, Amsterdam. Originating from Mariana Fernandez Mora’s ongoing research into decoloniality in AI, this project will focus on laying the ground for developing strategies to address colonial and extractive histories embedded in current AI systems by introducing the concept of slowness to a fast technology. The project will do this through a series of working sessions and material-based research workshops in collaboration with the ARIAS Artificial Worlds group which will culminate in a publication presented together with a symposium.
As Artificial Intelligence becomes increasingly prevalent in every aspect of our lives, it is crucial to address the way it amplifies existing colonial, extractive, and biased structures embedded in it. Issues such as the homogeneity of AI creators, biases, and the environmental impact of the technology are some examples of the urgent need for innovative approaches that counter act them. In response, the Slow AI project introduces the concept of ‘slowness’ to this fast technology, understanding it beyond a temporal metric and rather as a change in modes of engagement that resist notions of speed, efficiency, and optimisation rooted in its colonial and extractive history. It aims to challenge the prevailing trends of extraction, rapid consumption, immediate gratification, and the relentless pursuit of efficiency that have characterised the digital era, particularly within AI.
This research is informed by scholars like Virginia Eubanks, Kate Crawford, Safiya Noble, Ruha Benjamin, and James Bridle looking to emphasise the importance of addressing underlying power dynamics and systemic issues in AI from a multi-disciplinary perspective.
Team:
Mariana Fernández Mora (HvA)
Sabine Niederer (HvA)
Flavia Dzodan (Rietveld Academie)
Maarten Groen (HvA)
Zachary Formwalt (Rietveld Academie)
Andy Dockett (HvA)
Janine armin (HvA)
In collaboration with ARIAS Amsterdam and generously funded by the Centre of Expertise Creative Innovation, Slow AI aims to contribute to a more equitable and sustainable technological landscape.
For updates on the research and public events, subscribe to the ARIAS Artificial Worlds newsletter here.
Asking the reader to uncover and unfold each spread to reveal its content, this zine reminds us through these tearing and unravelling actions to care for how we engage with its pages and content. Functioning as a conceptual map that borrows graphic languages from natural textures and topographies, it becomes a landscape of practices that can help us navigate the sometimes frightening reality of our climate presents and futures.
Reflecting on this process, researcher Orestis Kollyris, in conversation with graphic designer Akash Sheshadri, discuss the way the design intersects with the works and their personal perspective on the importance of artistic research.
Finally, a sticker set invites us to spread visual climate imaginaries into other pages and surfaces. Rather than a compilation of finished works, this publication is a moment of reflection on the ongoing practices of its contributors. It is a window into the questions at the heart of the Climate Imaginaries at Sea programme and an invitation to engage with the urgency of the topics it addresses and strive to keep making waves.
The zine “Making Waves #2” was launched on the 23rd of April 2024 at VOX-POP, during the Climate Imaginaries at Sea Festival.
Email info@arias.amsterdam for a free copy.
About Climate Imaginaries at Sea
Climate Imaginaries at Sea speculates possible futures in and around water through various artistic and participatory research practices. Three collaborating research groups bring the project forward: Art & Spatial Praxis at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie (GRA), the Lectorate of the Academy of Theatre and Dance at the Amsterdam University of the Arts (AHK) and the Visual Methodologies Collective at the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences (AUAS). The research groups work in partnership with ARIAS, a platform for artistic research in Amsterdam, and a network of partners that includes Tolhuistuin, the Institute for Sound & Vision and CoECI – Centre of Expertise for Creative Innovation.
How can we liberate the imagination from recurring stereotypes that understand climate change as something from the future, far away, affecting others, while so many people around the world already live with its devastating impact? How can material research, interspecies perspectives and indigenous water and climate knowledges help us form new ways of relating to the climate emergency?
These are some of the questions that initiated this second volume of “Making Waves,” in which artists and researchers create micro-worlds that invite us into their research and processes. Exploring the role of imagination as a facilitator between generations and across species, geographies and material worlds, Amanda Piña, Carlo De Gaetano, Janine Armin, and Müge Yilmaz’s contributions open channels for understanding different facets of life with rising seas.