On January 14 (12:00 - 13:00), Lea Laura Michelsen from the Dept. of Aesthetics and Culture (Aarhus University), will visit CENSUS for a Brown Bag Seminar. 

As part of her PhD, Lea Laura Michelsen is researching the art of disappearing in an age of digital biometrics, focusing on masking and biopolitical resistance in contemporary aesthetic practices. She is guest editor of NJA (Nordic Journal of Aesthetics), is currently teaching the course The art of disappearing: Resistance and masking strategies in contemporary digital art, and has organized the two-day seminar: Facial machines and obfuscation in an age of biometrics and neural networks. Earlier, she worked at the Museum of Contemporary Art and at the National Gallery of Art in Copenhagen. She holds an MA in Modern Culture and a BA in Comparative Literature, both from the University of Copenhagen.

The art of disappearing: maks and biopolitical resistance in an age of biometrics
Why do we see so many media artists right now that work with masking and camouflaging in order to disappear from sight? What are they hiding from? And why do they emerge in this particular historical moment? In my research project, I explore what I term the art of disappearing (i.e. Zach Blas, Heather Dewey-Hagborg, Hito Steyerl, Adam Harvey, Leo Selvaggio, etc.) and the different forms of resistance to algorithmically guided biometrics articulated in these practices. My thesis is that they emerge as a response to a physiognomic renaissance – an echo of old fysiognoimc pseudo scientific representational systems from the 17^thand 18^th centuries, which are now disguised in new high tech technologies.

Join us in room 120 (Wiener) and bring your own brown bag-lunch!