Profiling
dal 7/6/2007 al 8/9/2007
Segnalato da
7/6/2007
Profiling
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
Two public art installations that explore the use of automated systems for "profiling" people. "Surveillance Video Entertainment Network" by Amy Alexander, Wojciech Kosma, Vincent Rabaud, Jesse Gilbert, and Nikhil Rasiwasia. SVEN humorously subverts the use of surveillance technologies ordinarily directed at profiling "suspicious subjects". David Rokeby's surveillance installation "Taken" (2002) provides two readings of the activities in the museum.
Two public art installations
Two public art installations that explore the use of automated systems for "profiling" people
comprise Profiling, an exhibition that begins on June 8 and runs through September 9,
2007, at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Addressing issues surrounding surveillance,
protection, privacy, and identity, the exhibition is organized by Christiane Paul, the
Whitney’s adjunct curator of new media arts.
The connection between surveillance and entertainment is at the core of SVEN -
Surveillance Video Entertainment Network (2005-present), by Amy Alexander, Wojciech
Kosma, Vincent Rabaud, Jesse Gilbert, and Nikhil Rasiwasia. SVEN humorously subverts the
use of surveillance technologies ordinarily directed at profiling "suspicious subjects." This
project asks the question, “If computer vision technology can be used to detect terrorists,
criminals, or other undesirables, why can’t it spot rock stars as well?” SVEN tracks visitors, detecting their characteristics, and analyzing their "rock star potential." The resulting video
and audio are displayed on a monitor, interrupting the standard security camera display
each time a potential rock star is detected. The idea is to examine and demystify concerns
about surveillance and computer systems not in terms of being watched, but in terms of
how the watching is being done -- and how else it might be done if other people were at
the wheel.
David Rokeby's surveillance installation Taken (2002) provides two readings of the
activities in the museum: a continuously accumulating history of movements of visitors that
is both a statistical plot of gallery activities and a record of each act of each visitor; and a
"catalog" of visitors' head shots with classifying adjectives randomly attributed to them (i.e.
'unsuspecting', 'complicit', 'hungry'). Taken addresses the increasing use of automated
systems for profiling people as part of the "war on terrorism" and was conceived as an
attempt to help ask questions about appropriate uses of technology.
Opening june 8, 2007
Whitney Museum of American Art
945 Madison Avenue at 75th Street - New York