This publication is about MACHINE RESEARCH – research on machines, research with machines, and research as a machine. It thus explores machinic perspectives to suggest a situation where the humanities are put into a critical perspective by machine driven ecologies, ontologies and epistemologies of thinking and acting. It aims to engage research and artistic practice that takes into account the new materialist conditions implied by nonhuman techno-ecologies. These include new ontologies and intelligence such as machine learning, machine reading and listening, systems-oriented perspectives to broadcast communication and conflict, the ethics and aesthetics of autonomous systems, and other post-anthropocentric reconsiderations of materiality and infrastructure.
The workshop leading to this publication is a collaboration between Digital Aesthetics Research Centre (Aarhus University), Constant (a non-profit, artist-run association for art and media based in Brussels), and transmediale.