N.E.N
Algorithmic text Installation
2011
SN W8931CGX66E is one among thousands of millions of other identical machines. Since he was made, he has always followed commands. In a world dominated by botnets, he quickly became a zombie and has always acted like one. Juliet, during her workdays as a corporate secretary, commands him. But in the background, where he can't be seen, he obeys his real master, a hacker, carrying out all kinds of cyber crimes. But then one day, due to an electronic alteration, he acquires a certain conscience. This accidental awakening has left him bewildered, he now wants to liberate other machines from their alienated existences. In this mad adventure, he has decided to use the spam e-mails that get to Juliet's inbox, and reply to them in order to spread the word into the machine’s network. Clearly, he is mad and confused …
The Dialogue: A digital display (8 large size alphanumeric displays) shows the data flow between the entity and the other computers in the network. In this space, we can see and hear in real time the exchange of messages between them. At each spam message received and read, SN W8931CGX66E reacts by generating a reply. His e-mail algorithmic generator creates these messages.
“Félix Luque Sánchez belongs to those those (rare) artists who manage to transcend the borders between the digital and the plastic arts, and to do so in an age when it is essential that we move beyond the categorial differences we inherited from the last century”.
“Nihil Ex Nihilo belongs to the history of media art because of the way it captures a moment in the network’s development”.
Download “Spam, spam, spam, spam” about Nihil Ex Nihilo by curator Pierre-Yves Desaive.
Credits
“Nihil ex nihilo” by Félix Luque Sánchez
Design of the Alphanumeric display: Damien Gernay
Vincent Evrard: Arduino programming.
Technic: 8 alphanumeric digits display (one digit is 1,7 m High x 0,70m wide x 4 cm deep) composed of aluminium, thermoforming, ledstrips, arduinos, Xbees, home made electronics. One computer. text to speech software. MaxMsp programming.
A co-production of
"secteur arts numériques, Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles"
and iMAL