_log(_rithm) :: multimedia dialogue between human and non-human units

log(rithm) is a quartet of two improvisation machines and two humans that brings selective surveillance, data analytics, and data ownership into a performative question. Both humans and improvisation machines rely on camera, audio, and motion sensors to read the situation of the performance and make musical decisions; this fact is purposefully manipulated through the selective lighting of the performance space, which both hides and reveals the working frame of the quartet. The human performers play with this and their ability to partially evade the sensors of the improvisation machines. Together, they experiment with what happens in an improvised dialogue when one hears/sees/perceives only part of the story.
In a contemporary society brimming with persistent user tracking and data collection, questions of data ownership and retention are unavoidable realities. The data of the performers/users and other detected human units are being extracted and used in the reproduction of sounds and visuals during the performance as well as the alternation of decision making approaches of the two machines - the faces reflected from the camera lens are copied and pasted, and the energy in the air is received from the microphones and the sensors to be then reinterpreted / reinforced.