The concept of scale is related to mapping, which is intrinsically related to colonisation and neocolonial military practices. Anthony Downey, Professor of Visual Culture in the Middle East and North Africa (Birmingham City University), draws a historical line from the development of cartographic devices and photogrammetry in the 18th and 19th centuries to the neocolonial extraction of data through AI-powered models of hyper-surveillance. Utilised for training neural networks and refining algorithms, these methods of data extraction effectively redefine the future of kinetic and non-kinetic warfare. Programmed within such systems, the operative and rationalising logic of algorithms are, Downey proposes, complicit in increasingly reductive determinations of what constitutes life and death in conflict zones.

COLOPHON

Host: Neja Berger

Guest: Anthony Downey

Recording and editing: Neja Berger

Audio Mix: Staš Kramar

Music: Gašper Torkar

Scale podcast series

Curated by Janez Fakin Janša

Produced by Marcela Okretič

for Tactics&Practice#14: Scale

Production:

Aksioma Institute of Contemporary Art

Ljubljana, 2023

Part of

Tactics&Practice

konS – Platform for Contemporary Investigative Art