When Facts Don't Matter

Lismore Castle Arts presents When Facts Don’t Matter, a group exhibition exploring how artists are responding to internet surveillance and data capture.

The exhibition looks at various aspects of online data capture – highlighted in recent times by Facebook data controversies, we are now more aware than ever of how our personal data can be shared, used, manipulated or deleted. We have assumed in the past that our subscription to social media platforms, or indeed any other form of data capture online, from banking to shopping, means companies will respect our rights to privacy or secrecy, however this is becoming less certain as news stories gather of data compromises.

In his book Psycho-politics: Neoliberalism and New Technologies of Power, Byung-Chul Han writes: Today, we are entering the age of digital psychopolitics. It means passing from passive surveillance to active steering. As such, it is precipitating a further crisis of freedom: now, free will is at stake. Big Data is a highly efficient psychopolitical instrument that makes it possible to achieve comprehensive knowledge of the dynamics of social communication. This knowledge is knowledge for the sake of domination and control.... For human beings to be able to act freely, the future must be open. However, Big Data is making it possible to predict human behavior. This means the future is becoming calculable and controllable.

The exhibition seeks to ask what takes place online and what is the nature of the exchange between the user and the other side of the screen – and in the process looks to the bigger picture – who controls data, who controls information, and ultimately, who controls the digital versions of ourselves. Are we offering up our own autonomy in the new virtual world we inhabit, and are we enslaving ourselves in a neo-liberal virtual reality?