Artivism and the new political subjectiviies in the post-digital era

Abstract

This paper identifies inequities in the development and dissemination of image technologies, which privilege a hegemonic model of culture, and their implications in terms of annihilation of dissident narratives and existences. Some examples of technological bias are discussed, from the color calibration model for developing photographic films proposed by Kodak in the 1940s, the Shirley Card, to recent research that seeks to infer people’s gender and sexual orientation with the aid of databases and artificial intelligence algorithms. In contrast, we also present artistic works developed in the last decade that question the legitimacy of using these technologies as tools for surveillance and monitoring of bodies. The 2012 and 2017 artworks Facial Weaponization Suite, by Zach Blas, and Probably Chelsea, by Heather Dewey-Hagborg, are
read under the aegis of the “post-digital” to highlight aspects that tend to distort hierarchical and excluding structures.