The Night With a K, video/sound, 12:15min, 2021
In order to train and refine artificial intelligence processes, area in images are manually identified, outlined and labelled by online workers, mostly from the Global South. Here, all the 878 frames of Lumière’s film “Workers Leaving the Factory’’ were uploaded onto an online labelling platform, which assigned those images to anonymous online click workers around the globe. Each frame was identified, outlined and labelled individually by unique workers–878 in total.
The end result manifests as an audiovisual digital collage that not only disassembles Lumière’s film but also reclaims and fuses together the viewpoints of these workers through a vivid dream interpretation performed by one of them. By looking at how new technologies produce their own subjects, the reassembly of Lumière’s film, within the context of contemporary working conditions, prompts us to reconsider our focus. It suggests that the question no longer revolves around how to depict labor in images but rather delves into the laborious process of crafting images themselves.
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In order to train and refine artificial intelligence processes, area in images are manually identified, outlined and labelled by online workers, mostly from the Global South. Here, all the 878 frames of Lumière’s film “Workers Leaving the Factory’’ were uploaded onto an online labelling platform, which assigned those images to anonymous online click workers around the globe. Each frame was identified, outlined and labelled individually by unique workers–878 in total.
The end result manifests as an audiovisual digital collage that not only disassembles Lumière’s film but also reclaims and fuses together the viewpoints of these workers through a vivid dream interpretation performed by one of them. By looking at how new technologies produce their own subjects, the reassembly of Lumière’s film, within the context of contemporary working conditions, prompts us to reconsider our focus. It suggests that the question no longer revolves around how to depict labor in images but rather delves into the laborious process of crafting images themselves.
