{"id":1803,"date":"2013-08-31T13:40:47","date_gmt":"2013-08-31T20:40:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jamescoupe.com\/?page_id=1803"},"modified":"2013-08-31T13:44:49","modified_gmt":"2013-08-31T20:44:49","slug":"visual-arts-sanctum-at-the-henry","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/jamescoupe.com\/?page_id=1803","title":{"rendered":"Visual Arts: Sanctum at the Henry"},"content":{"rendered":"

Seattle Weekly, June 25, 2013<\/a><\/p>\n

The Henry\u2019s new surveillance-art installation combines your face and others\u2019 anonymous social-media updates. Yes, it\u2019s as creepy as it sounds.<\/strong><\/p>\n

By Brian Miller Tue., Jun 25 2013 at 04:35PM<\/p>\n

Do you ever get the sense you\u2019re being followed? Crossing the pedestrian bridge over 15th Avenue to the Henry Art Gallery, there isn\u2019t a drone in the clear May sky. Nor are any of those Google Street View cars driving past. Nor do I worry that the NSA\u2019s PRISM apparatus is tracking my cellphone calls. But Sanctum<\/em><\/strong> is watching.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Big Art is watching you<\/em>.
credit: R.J. S\u00e1nchez<\/p><\/div>
\nIn fact, as you walk past the Henry\u2019s new interactive video installation, Sanctum<\/em> is tracking you, calling out to you, and, if you answer that call, creating a custom-made story for you. And then it politely asks for access to your Facebook status updates, which it will then incorporate\u2014anonymously\u2014into demographically tailored tales for other passersby who follow.<\/p>\n

James Coupe and Juan Pampin, the tech-savvy instructors at the University of Washington\u2019s Center for Digital Arts and Experimental Media (aka DXARTS) who created Sanctum<\/em>, want you to consider how your public behavior can be collected and analyzed. They placed their six video cameras at one of the busiest pathways on campus, where just about every passing student has a busy social-media presence. \u201cThis taps into what Google and Facebook are trying to do,\u201d says Coupe of Sanctum\u2019s<\/em> tracking software.<\/p>\n

The siren-like Sanctum<\/em> is actively soliciting you: first by using your own image as a lure, second via directional audio, or what Pampin calls \u201cbeaming . . . these kind of sonic tentacles that try to draw people in.\u201d On three banks of video monitors, facing south and west, Sanctum grabs your image and bounces it back when you walk over for a closer look. Hey, I\u2019m on TV!<\/em> you think. Then Sanctum begins speaking to you with a computer-generated voice that sounds like an old Laurie Anderson or Radiohead album. If you\u2019re female, the voice rises in pitch; if you\u2019re male, it lowers. What you\u2019re hearing\u2014and reading on a text ticker\u2014is a story that Coupe calls \u201can individual personal narrative. It\u2019s composed for you, in response to you.\u201d But it\u2019s not about you; it\u2019s not that creepy.<\/p>\n

Sanctum<\/em> is profiling you, classifying you by age and sex, \u201cto give people feeling of being singled out in a crowd,\u201d says Coupe. If that sounds ominous, making you think of London\u2019s many CCTV cameras or the TSA body scans at the airport, \u201cthis kind of stuff is being used more by Google than the government,\u201d he adds. The reason is money: Sanctum<\/em> is an art project employing software (some licensed, some proprietary) with tremendous commercial applications. Sanctum\u2019s<\/em> servers and software are making a hash out of others\u2019 anonymous Facebook postings, Coupe explains, using algorithms to create targeted stories, rather than the coupons or ads that a commercial enterprise might. The story isn\u2019t about you but people like<\/em> you, who fit your demo\u2014the sort of people you\u2019d friend on Facebook or befriend at school or work.<\/p>\n

Then, if you willingly sign up for the project on the designers\u2019 website (sanctum.io), or on Facebook, or via the QR codes prominently placed\u2014along with privacy warnings\u2014around the Henry, Sanctum\u2019s<\/em> computers will be granted temporary access to your Facebook status updates for up to 60 days. (You can also opt out of the project\u2019s monitoring by the same means.) The database increases its many possible story permutations with each new person who signs up. Your life becomes Sanctum\u2019s<\/em> story fodder.<\/p>\n

However, \u201cstory\u201d isn\u2019t really the right term here. What the software spits out is more like the old Surrealist game, Exquisite Corpse, or, more charitably, haiku: bits of random daily detritus that reminds you how useless most social-media updates truly are. \u201cToday the bus smells like cough drops, stale popcorn, and shit,\u201d says one vignette. \u201cStopped for a scone in Kirkland,\u201d says another. Should we care? I certainly don\u2019t\u2014but I\u2019m not on Facebook, and I\u2019m not one to share the mundane details of my life with others. They\u2019re boring to me, too. And I doubt even the most assiduous Facebook poster considers their journaling to be art.<\/p>\n

Yet Sanctum<\/em> draws viewers and mines ever more data. (The Henry is unable to say how many have signed up to date.) During its May beta period, many curious students were taking cell-phone pictures of the video array, creating a kind of Russian-doll mirror effect: image being captured into image, demographic profile being absorbed into narrative bits and bytes. (Many will doubtlessly post the images to Facebook, or write about Sanctum<\/em> there\u2014creating ever more story material for the two-year project.)<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t love the piece, but it\u2019s preferable to Seattle Art Museum\u2019s costlier and permanent MIRROR<\/em> installation at Second and Union, created by Doug Aitken. There, interactive sensors trigger prior scenes Aitken filmed around the Northwest. The imagery, much larger than Sanctum\u2019s<\/em>, feels dated and obsolete\u2014not truly, immediately responsive to the environment, what\u2019s happening in the now. And it\u2019s presented up on the second-floor fa\u00e7ade above SAM\u2019s entrance, not at eye level. Sanctum, at least, engages you as a pedestrian. MIRROR<\/em> just feels like Times Square signage: more commercial and less sophisticated. Sanctum<\/em> is sneaky and insidious, but at least it tells you what it\u2019s doing and what it\u2019s collecting.<\/p>\n

Coupe and Pampin acknowledge how Sanctum\u2019s<\/em> proprietary software might be monetized in the future. (The UW owns it and will license it.) Marketers would love a technology that identifies and entices customers, calls out to them with specific offers or coupons, even without access to their private social media. Internet advertisers are already doing the same, providing you with tailored pop-up ads based on your browsing, whether you like it or not. And whatever your privacy settings on Firefox or Safari, there\u2019s no guarantee of privacy in the public square.<\/p>\n

A government or commercialized version of Sanctum<\/em> could add many more filtering criteria, looking at your skin tone, height, weight, clothing, and so forth. Is that a turban on your head? Are you wearing a beard? Is that a Koran you\u2019re carrying? The software wants to know.<\/p>\n

Or imagine a scenario in which you walk into the lobby at Nordstrom, and a video kiosk greets you with a cheerful \u201cHey, Brian, you look fat for those pants, and you really could use a good haircut\u2014that long hair really makes you look old. Also, you should consider updating your eyeglasses and wristwatch. And those shoes look like something a hobo might wear.\u201d Of course I might say the same to myself in the mirror each morning, but do I want to be tracked thusly in public?<\/p>\n

Yet as I watch young, socially networked UW students pass the Henry, many are plainly curious about Sanctum<\/em>. In part, a Henry publicist tells me, the project is meant to lure younger visitors into the museum, which is a fine objective. And all their social-media updates get purged from the project, so no one\u2019s privacy ought to be compromised.<\/p>\n

Still, inside the lobby you find yourself staring at the ugly backsides of 18 large television sets, which block out the windows and spoil the view. I pity the poor front-desk attendant, who used to enjoy a constant parade of pedestrians outside. In a way there\u2019s less human interaction now, less eye contact. Then again, half the students I observe have their eyes glued to their phones, walking and texting as they pass. Some don\u2019t even notice Sanctum, and some may not care if they\u2019re being profiled at all.<\/p>\n

bmiller@seattleweekly.com<\/p>\n

HENRY ART GALLERY<\/strong> UW campus, 543-2280, henryart.org <\/a>and sanctum.io<\/a>. Through November 2015.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"<\/a>

Seattle Weekly, June 25, 2013 The Henry\u2019s new surveillance-art installation combines your face and others\u2019 anonymous social-media updates. Yes, it\u2019s as creepy as it sounds. By Brian Miller Tue., Jun 25 2013 at 04:35PM Do you ever get the sense you\u2019re being followed? Crossing the pedestrian bridge over 15th Avenue to the Henry Art Gallery, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1803","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/jamescoupe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/jamescoupe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/jamescoupe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jamescoupe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jamescoupe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1803"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"http:\/\/jamescoupe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1803\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1815,"href":"http:\/\/jamescoupe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1803\/revisions\/1815"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/jamescoupe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}