Alexa, meet Lauren: L.A. artist turns her apartment into an experiment in artificial intelligence
Design Media Arts Assistant Professor Lauren McCarthy's work explores current social and technological systems and structures for being a person and interacting with other people. In this most recent work, guests were invited to her Los Angeles apartment, while she was controlling the environment from a gallery in Amsterdam with the help of smart-home devices.
"At 9 on a Friday night, I knocked on a door in a nondescript Los Angeles apartment building. The only distinguishing feature was a small label with red text that read “Lauren.” Soon came a whirring sound and the click of the door unlocking. My night with Lauren had begun.
Lauren is the creation of artist and UCLA professor Lauren McCarthy, whose weeklong interactive performance was part of the IDFA DocLab, an International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam showcase for new-media projects, and also part of “Vulnerability: The Space Between,” an exhibition at Young Projects Gallery in West Hollywood.
McCarthy turned her apartment into a smart home, to be controlled remotely from a gallery in Amsterdam. Guests signed up to spend one night in the apartment, which was monitored by cameras and microphones, and where not only the front door but also the lights, music and appliances were controlled by McCarthy, half a world away. Video images from the morning hours (early evening in Amsterdam) were on display on a computer at IDFA, where viewers could see McCarthy running the show and interacting with her guests.
The performance was inspired by artificial intelligence products for the home, like Google Home and Amazon’s Alexa. McCarthy became interested in how AI is sold as convenience but actually brings surveillance and commerce into our most intimate spaces.
The prospect of spending the night in a place where someone else is controlling the environment is bound to create anxiety. What if she locks all the doors and turns the stereo up really loud? Or turns the thermostat down really low? Will she watch me in the shower?
My husband, Oliver, and I walked into a living room that was tastefully decorated in a minimal, modern style. Nobody was there, but an electronic voice greeted us by name. The voice seemed to emanate from the stereo, where the display read “Lauren."— Sharon Mizota , Nov. 28, 2017
Thie post is an excerpt, read the full article at the Los Angeles Times website.