For Ever More Images?

In the present moment, we use machines to capture almost everything we see; at the same time, we are constantly being photographed by machines without our consent or awareness. Our faces, emotions, habits, beliefs, and data are being collected, stored, and valued in massive and invisible ways, serving warfare, surveillance, global capital, and risk management systems whose aim is to predict the future and produce profit. Our world sometimes feels like a crystal ball, absorbing its surroundings and projecting its predetermined plan back at us. Meanwhile, digital images have become both omnipresent and invisible, rendering inward reflection difficult and threatening to mute the transformative power of the human imagination.

In response, “For Ever More Images?” gathers an interdisciplinary group of artists, thinkers, and activists to interrogate the all-seeing eyes and ever-multiplying black boxes that increasingly govern our lives. In the face of such dire conditions, this digital catalog gestures towards new possibilities that these same technologies open up. Radical uses of the image remain possible – from collective historical witnessing, to contested testimony, and evolving counter surveillance practices – which hold out the promise of critical understanding, social engagement, and action.