0.30402944246776265
Installation. 2013-2015
n number of computers, visualization plugin, automaton plugin (both plugins require Freenet)

Concept Description Installations Instructions Thesis Software Contact


Installations

The installation was shown for the first time in the group exhibition 
"In the Graveyards of Interdisciplinarity" in the spaces of JMVAC and 
Vilnius Gates in Vilnius in 2013. The installation was comprised of 
three chairs and three computers with Freenet and its visualization 
plugin installed. The leading text introduced differences between 
Freenet Opennet and Freenet Darknet modes, proposing that in Darknet 
mode, the number used to name the installation and the figure 
representing the self-location would change over the duration of 
interaction between the nodes. Keeping in mind Milgram's concept of six 
degrees of separation, the installation in Vilnius proposed the 
possibility of nodes interacting in a way similar to that in social 
behavior. Therefore, the installation itself was introduced and 
conceptualized as a social environment and proposed a life-like 
situation (Fig. 1-2).





Fig. 1-2. JMVC, Vilnius, 2013

Solo installations at OKK/Raum 29 in Berlin (Fig. 3-14) and Malonioji 6 
(Fig. 15-23) in Vilnius in 2014, for the first time, fully implemented 
Darknet Freenet mode and was arranged on twelve computers while 
eliminating the chairs provided in the first installation. The computers 
installed within the space claimed less importance and were placed in 
order to fill up physical space. At the same time, focus was placed on 
monitors showing the interaction between the computers (nodes). The 
Darknet Freenet mode, which here was installed for the first time, 
enabled the virtual relocation of computers, thus reducing the 
importance of the computer location registered in the title of the 
installation, except as the previously mentioned starting point of the 
mapping territory and its non-human nature.

























Fig. 3-14. OKK/Raum 29, Berlin, 2014




















Fig. 15-23. Malonioji 6, Vilnius, 2014

The first development of the installation and the proposed life-like 
environment was not convincing because the installation did not simulate 
life directly. Therefore, a further concept extending to distributed 
neural networks was considered and introduced.

The study anticipated that the Darknet Freenet would potentially 
function as a neural network, triggering neighborhood neurons to move 
chunks of information back and forth. It was assumed that, within the 
time t, the nodes connected and sharing similar information in the 
Darknet Freenet would get closer to each other, forming clusters of 
information similar to those stored in the cortices of the brain. The 
expected outcome was the proposition that the movement of digital 
information in the Darknet Freenet be likened to information spread 
throughout the brain.

Such a framework enabled the installation to be accelerated with yet 
another plugin that would be able to collect information from the 
outside. A new Automaton plugin was designed in order to collect 
information from the Internet and to upload it to the Freenet. Although 
the Automaton made automated functions, the question remained how and 
what information would be selected, if that information could be 
randomized in such a setting, and, if yes, at what level. The bid was 
made for human interaction. In order to trigger automated functionality 
(in a neural network this would mean "firing" neuron), a manual search 
would need to be performed. Therefore, all this software architecture 
brought yet another aspect to the installation: the idea of an 
artificially intelligent system.

The two individual exhibitions were followed by an installation at the 
international festival for new media, Pixxelpoint in 2014 in Nova 
Gorica, Slovenia (Fig. 23-24). Although the installation only used three 
computers, the work was finally complete with fully functional 
Visualization and Automaton plugins, which do not require human input.





Fig. 23-24. Pixxelpoint, Nova Gorica, 2014

The conceptual part was slightly changed once again because the 
artificial neural network used to describe the installation was too 
ambitious and not obvious enough. The conceptual part was simplified to 
the "communication" between computers, proposing a post-human state. 
Having only the reference to a social environment and interaction among 
people, the concept brought the viewer closer to the idea of a system 
and the interactivity of elements within it. Although simplified, the 
installation included all elements defined at the beginning of the 
research, including the updating of information based on the previously 
available information in the databases, the interaction with the 
external world (in this case, the Internet), and the exchange of 
information with other similar elements (in this case, computers charged 
with similar software architecture).