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Lauren Lee McCarthy


Info︎

LAUREN works
  1. LAUREN
  2. SOMEONE
  3. LAUREN Portable
  4. Exhibition: You Can Say
  5. The Changing Room
  6. Waking Agents
  7. I.A. Suzie

Saliva works
  1. Exhibition: Bodily Autonomy (Saliva Bar)
  2. Saliva Retreat
  3. Saliva
  4. Testing

Surrogate works
  1. Surrogate
  2. Exhibition: Data Relations
  3. Exhibition: Reproduction Otherwise
  4. Surrogate Performance
  5. Womb Walk

Autonomous works
  1. Voice In My Head
  2. Driverless
  3. Unlearning Language
  4. 24h HOST
  5. Seeing Voices

Muted works
  1. Exhibition: I Heard Talking Is Dangerous
  2. Muted
  3. I heard TALKING IS DANGEROUS
  4. Good Night
  5. Good Morning
  6. What do you want me to say?
  7. Sleepover
  8. Later Date
  9. Appreciate You

Other recent works
  1. Follower
  2. Social Turkers
  3. Vibe Check
  4. I’m glad you asked
  5. Autoreply
  6. pplkpr
  7. us+

Teaching & pedagogy
  1. p5.js
  2. Open Source Software Toolkits for the Arts Report
  3. Web We Want (W3C TPAC)
  4. Smarter Home
  5. Network Media
  6. Performing User
  7. Senior Capstone
  8. Disability, Design, and the Web
  9. Interactivity
  10. Conversation & Computation
  11. Social Hacking
  12. Critical APIs
  13. Computational Media
  14. Introduction to Programming for the Visual Arts (Free online course)

Archive
  1. Beyond the Breakdown
  2. How We Act Together
  3. Wake Words
  4. Friend Crawl
  5. Welcomer
  6. M/WITM
  7. The Changing Room: Brisbane
  8. Social Soul
  9. You Can Say
  10. Tools for Improved Social Interacting
  11. Inactive Account Manager
  12. Facebook Mood Manipulator
  13. LOVEINT
  14. SCRIPT

Mark

I.A. Suzie

Lauren Lee McCarthy and David Leonard






With millions of aging citizens, we are facing a crisis of care. When confronted with the prospect of caring for aging relatives, artificial intelligence systems like Alexa and Google Home can augment care and stand in for the presence of family, friends, and medical providers. But viewing these systems as utilitarian devices obscures the human responsibilities they carry. Will they be able to serve as advocates for the aging population?

In a one week durational performance, we embodied the role of A.I., functioning as a remote virtual caregiver in 80-year-old Mary Ann’s home in North Carolina. We were able to watch over Mary Ann 24 hours a day, speak to her, and fully control the lights and appliances within her home via a custom smart home system we created. Throughout the process, we documented the relationship with an array of 360 cameras capturing panoptic views into various rooms in the home.

The film documents this performance, and the relationship that developed between Mary Ann and the virtual care system we became, which she named I.A. Suzie. I.A. Suzie puts the viewer into the role of virtual care system, giving a direct lens into the ethical dilemmas that are rapidly being codified into artificial intelligence. This interactive film created from a real-life scenario asks us to confront our relationship with AI partners at the end of life.

This project was supported in part by a Journalism 360 Award from the Google News Initiative, Knight Foundation and Online News Association, and a grant from UCLA.

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