!brute_force

!brute_force by Maja Smrekar*

What can people learn from animals? How can we have a more respectful and loving relationship with all of them? What is the role of technology in this relationship between humans and animals? Can it help us to improve the way we relate with other species? And, more specifically, can artificial intelligence help develop our empathy and connection with non-human beings?

!brute_force is a project by Slovenian artist Maja Smrekar that reflects on the possibilities, regulated by technology, of a real but also poetic meeting between a human and a dog.

Placed in a labyrinth, the artist and the dog set out to find each other. An artificial intelligence organizes and reorganizes this structure according to their heart rhythms; only when their hearts are synchronized is confluence between the two possible.

In this way !brute_force takes a new look at the dynamics of human domination and oppression of animals and nature, and the crucial role of technology in a possible reunion.

At the same time, !brute_force highlights the importance of collaborative, transdisciplinary knowledge, based on the concurrence of the fields of neuroscience, philosophy, programming and dog training, among others, to the construction of new imaginaries and ways of inhabiting the world.

Public presentations

I. Click Festival 2019, Helsingor, Denmark (19 May 2019).
II. Ars Electronica Festival 2019, Linz, Austria (September 5 to 9, 2019).
III. Kapelica Gallery, Ljubljana, Slovenia (December 2019).
IV. Click Festival 2020, Helsingor, Denmark (May 2020).
Premiere: Ars Electronica Festival 2020, Linz, Austria (September 2020).