IMPAKT FESTIVAL Exhibition
Algorithmic Superstructures
Algorithmic superstructures are crystallising into an overarching framework. radically changing and challenging the fabrics of society, including our understanding of public democracy, media ecology, and collective action. Our increasingly encoded environment is mediated by digital devices and facilitated by computational infrastructure. The exhibition illustrates how new technologies have become instrumental in advancing some of the greatest challenges we are facing today: the dissociation of publics leading to increased populist tendencies, authoritarianism and social conflicts and an ambient feeling instability and insecurity on a global scale. The works in the exhibition are referential to new forms of governance and hegemony being established, that stand in opposition to democratic values and procedures. Illustrating how algorithmic superstructures are shapinbng our thinking, our perception, and value system, they speak to a need for accountability and new forms of public democracy. The exhibition asks how, in this landscape we can preserve our democratic legitimacy whilst embracing technological developments and maintaining the integrity of democratic processes.