-by Barbora Horská (Curator / Editor-in-chief of Improper Dose)

Now, finally, Autopoietic Encounters!

Dehumanizing entire groups of people while considering legal personhood for autonomous machines, building empathetic narratives toward androids with literal thinking and lack of emotional expressions—traits stereotypically connected with autism—while continuing othering actual autistic people or admiring the art generated by AI while not only professional artists, but anyone wishing to express themselves creatively can hardly make ends meet in a mundane job that we were made to fear losing at the hands of the very AI. Even scaling down to technology widely used, we don't seem to be getting it right—if by right we don't mean the far-right and other hateful groups that get to freely spread disinformation on platforms where activists are being shadowbanned and blocked unless they use alternative words to avoid algorithms that were supposed to protect from the very notion they reinforce. Our relationship with technology seems to be filled with psychological projection—from philosophical debates on core aspects of humanity to fearing the uprising of the oppressed (the number of science-fiction movies about violent robotic attacks against humans, especially from Hollywood production, speaks for itself).

All in all, it's as much fascination as fear, and the production of advanced technological instruments continues. So, what can we do in a situation when everything there is to fear about autonomous machines is simply a reflection of ourselves? Perhaps—keep looking.

In this edition of Improper Dose, dedicated to all things robotic, we offer you two essays from curators of the Autopoietic Encounters exhibition—Jesse de Pagter takes you down the historical path while Justina Špeirokaité provides a guided tour with insights into each artwork and performance, with an added interview with Kate Davis, the author of “Logging onto Love”, focused on ethics of robotic companions. Abdelrahman Hassan then expands the topic with an essay about data activism and joyful resistance. In addition, we bring you another episode of Improper Sessions—this time, Elizabeth Spouse has interviewed for you the self-proclaimed femme-revenge band ZINN. And an(other) interview also closes this issue—Justina Špeirokaité talked with Ukrainian, Vienna-based artist Kateryna Lysovenko about her work, mythology, violence, soviet monuments, feminism and envisioning new futures. If you are missing a comic, you are right! While we don't have a new release now, I recommend revisiting #6 from Pedro del Real's series “I Run High On The New And I Love The Old”, where the author contemplates who allows and who is allowed when it comes to technological use.

See you next month!

IMPROPER DOSE NO. 1/2023