Exploring loneliness within a rapidly shifting technological landscape – a new collision of sound, image and words through performance and installation.
Machine Membranes is the collaborative project of artists Nayara Leite and Marie Nerland, and musician/composer Mari Kvien Brunvoll. It explores how, as humans experience the world, we are tracked by sensors and algorithms, and increasingly surrounded by machines, which gradually become part of us. The work originates in a shared interest in science fiction and in the dystopian, yet alluring, aspects of technological development.
In Part Two of this project the artists investigate loneliness in the context of the rapid development of Artificial Intelligence. What happens when AI reproduces human voices and sounds to resemble human beings?
This artistic collaboration began three years ago and its first phase culminated in a performance shown in 2023 at Lydgalleriet. In Machine Membranes - Part One the artists explored relations between technology and the human body – from the first typewriter, called cembalo scrivano, to present-day machines that scan the reactions of the human body increasing their potential for surveillance.
Light designer: Randiane Aalberg Sandboe
Technician: Tine Adler
Machine Membranes – Part Two is supported by Bergen City Council, Billedkunstnernes Vederlagsfond (BKV) and Norsk Komponistforening. Parts of the material were developed at the Live Studio at Bergen Kunsthall in 2024.