THE CONCEPT
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Spectactular Data is an interdisciplinary project that explores emerging registers of fascism and authoritarian rule, with particular emphasis on the current transformation of social and political domains by the deployment of technologies of surveillance, social media, cryptocurrencies, augmented reality and AI.
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While the scale of the final event will depend on the human and financial resources the project can acquire, we envision it being part research project, part academic conference and part performance art event. Spectacular Data is an invitation to think through the dimensions of the social and physical reality in which fascist forces operate, and to gather ideas that converge toward an understanding of the transformation of the terminology and experience of fascism.
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The project began to take shape in stages:
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Stage I (February to September 2023)
Research to identify potential institutional and individual participants and project partners.
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Stage II (October 2023)
Presentation of Phase I research results and project programme in conjunction with the 40th anniversary of the SFU Institute for the Humanities
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Phase III (October 2023 to Fall 2024)
Participating in the Roundhouse 'Poetics of Possibilities' Project, with Derek Simons and Andreas Kahre. Ongoing research and development toward an event, based in Vancouver, that includes round table discussions, artists projects, media and performances.
THE FRAMEWORK
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In 2022, we began to ask how we might explore the registers of fascism and/or authoritarianism that have emerged in the past decade, including self-avowed fascist movements, accusations of fascism against both the Left and Right, and the current state of academic research on fascism. In our initial discussions, we imagined an event that would provide contributions from different disciplines, artists and academics to gather ideason the technologies of surveillance, social media, crypto-valuation, and Artificial Intelligence (AI). We thought of calling it ’Spectacular Data : Politics of the Coded Present’, focused on exploring the development of the so–called ‘Metaverse’ and its effects on the social agency of individuals and communities, particularly as they relate to concepts of Presence, Space and Value.
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As we discussed specific aspects of this complex, it became apparent that the 1994 ‘Spectacular State: Fascism and the Modern Imagination’ project could serve as a model, and that the questions it engaged were still, if differently, relevant in the present. Re-orienting the central question to once again explore definitions and practices of fascism, our working title has changed to ‘Spectacular Data: Fascism and the Coded Present.’ Exploring these questions just at the time that Open AI presented the first generation of ChatGPT shifted our focus once more to how fascism is now operating in a reality that is being transformed profoundly, rapidly and, like an iceberg’s turning, potentially catastrophic in scope.
PARTICIPANTS
THE BACKGROUND
The project was initiated by Richard Pinet, Derek Simons, Andreas Kahre and Sourayan Mookerjea during a series of discussions that began in the summer of 2021.
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What in the 1990s was considered a ‘fertile breeding ground’ for fascism — an environment of uncertainty, friction and fear — has grown into a global crisis of climate change, mass migration, ideologically-driven violence and international conflicts on the brink of nuclear war. At the same time, we now encounter disembodied modes of fascism that make effective use of social media, surveillance and algorithms (such as the one Elon Musk recently proposed to ’capture the communication of 80 percent of humanity’). In short, the emergence of the digital sphere as a social space has created new contexts and opportunities for fascism, contributing to an atmosphere that seems much more congenial to fascist interests than when we organized the Spectacular State back in 1995.(Please see the original program guide for SpecState below
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Our ambition for the Spectacular Data project is to create, at whatever scale is feasible, an opportunity to contest fascist interests at both the level of form and of content. We intend to present cutting edge research in the academy and the arts within an innovative participatory environment, highlighting opportunities to creatively identify, understand and resist fascist or fascist-adjacent modes of engagement through technology. For a more detailed overview of this initiative please go to Research section of this site >