Documentary on Chaos and Control
Randomness and Prediction explores the complexities of our contemporary algorithmic age. Just as they were in ancient times by Bambara diviners, today algorithms are tools for predicting the future: from pre-empting crimes and targeting terrorists with automated drones, from tracking the metadata tags of social media users, to predicting the rise and fall of derivative financial instruments with high-frequency algorithms, our very actions and desires are captured by the circuits of the world’s big data centers. But this history also reveals the limits of our attempts to rid the world of randomness and overcome chaos.
FPGA-based physical modelling. Spring mass system combined with wave table oscillator, somewhat like scanned synthesis, though the FPGA implementation takes some shortcuts. Coded in Verilog HDL, running on a Lattice Ice40 8k, all done with the open source tool chain. I don’t have time to work on it right now, but when I do, the next steps will involve the analog circuitry required to turn it into a really responsive instrument.
09:27 mins
A film essay on the origins of observation in the cosmos, on the nature of causality and subjective necessity.
09:41 mins
While working in Athens in 2011, I began to wonder where the river Ilisos was: that river where Socrates and Phaedrus had their famous conversation. As I soon discovered, it had long since been canalized beneath the modern city Athens had become. We went to see what was left of it, in a vacant lot within the sprawl, and followed the dialogue for clues to where the actual dialogue might have taken place.
Metastases is a film essay on mutation and the coextensiveness of life and death. Premiered October 24th 2009, at Usine-C (Montreal).
ORGANON
Directed by Melanie Verville and Alexander Wilson
Performers: Catherine Cédilot, Mélanie Verville,
Live Music: Félix Antoine Morin, Alexander Wilson
Set & costumes: Geneviève Boivin
Media: Alexander Wilson
Lighting: Armando Gomez Rubio
