Adam Basanta
ROUGH BEAST

There are moments where one wakes up and–disoriented with their environment–cannot help but inquire as to what are the structures in which we find ourselves individually enmeshed. And further, what are the internal structures which produces the feeling or perception of individuality.

In a materialist worldview infused with information metrics and advanced statistical computation, one must confront the question seriously: can individual actions be adequately represented, explained, and predicted by large-scale information processing? And further, would such a world–in which monitored individuals resonate within bespoke structures–be preferable for the individual in question?

What is an individual, what is a corporate entity, if not a managerial organism? A collection of nodes, relations, roles, and structures, in a dynamic dance. A shape with lion body and the head of a man, moving its slow thighs, an algorithmic gaze blank and pitiless as the sun. A second coming.

Moving laterally across observations, ROUGH BEAST is a work of speculative auto-fiction on the future of artificial intelligence and labour, network science and data rights; on personal doubts and collective memories; on the role of the artist in a corporate environment.

Produced as part of an artist residency at Ubisoft Montreal (2022–2023).