How to sweep the floor?

The world today is complex, and so is our anxiety. At first glance, AI grows more powerful and can now predict wars and revolutions. Look deeper, and AI seems to be a symptom of the times, not a solution. 

How did my great-grandparents survive the political horrors of the twentieth century? How do my friends survive heavy bombings in Kyiv every night? Their knowledge never made it into any database. AI doesn't know about it. Yet it is extremely valuable, and it is what's needed to answer the question: what are the magic words to get through catastrophic anxiety?

 

RESEARCH CONTEXT

The work explores the dichotomy between two different epistemic models. On one side, the ontological claims of AI systems that "know everything". On the other, the situated know-how of "experts of the everyday". Asking AI to find solutions to problems like neofeudalism, surveillance capitalism, and the climate crisis only intensifies them. Alternatively, the experience of previous generations, or of people surviving crises, could be a great source of wisdom. Though it is hardly applicable to different contexts and issues. Goethe's poem
Der Zauberlehrling provides a narrative structure and binds these two modes. The young apprentice abuses his freshly learned magic powers, turning a household task into a scene of chaos. And it is only the old master who is able to speak the "magic words" that solve the problem. In reality, we often learn thanks to other people, by asking them questions and valuing their experience, making polite mantras like "Danke", "thank you" or "дякую" an integral part of learning something new.

 

DESIGN PROJECT
The core object is a besom: vinyk, [ˈʋinɪk], (Ukr. віник), equipped with a motion detection sensor. When the sensor detects the sweeping movement, it sends a signal to a Raspberry Pi board running a script. While the "fever dream poem" written by the Composing Cyborgs API runs on the screen, every correctly detected sweep interrupts it by printing a line from the interviews. The first is an interview with my father about my great-grandfather. The second is a conversation with a friend who volunteers in Kyiv, helping people clear the debris after shelling.