Week 4

Lead by Bruce Schneier

Monday, July 27, 2020 at 3pm

Matthew Battles & Sarah Newman

metaLAB, a trans-disciplinary project hosted at BKC, makes use of artistic and design practice to explore systems, question disciplinary norms, and develop new strategies for research, particularly in light of emerging technologies. In this talk, metaLAB principals Matthew Battles and Sarah Newman will discuss their unusual career paths in academia and beyond, sharing recent work on AI, the natural world, collaborative creation, and unconventional teaching practices.

Like all platforms for experimentation, metaLAB is less a destination than a perpetual work in progress. Rooted in the arts and humanities, straddling scholarly, critical, and creative practice, it is a community of scholars, designers, artists, makers, technologists, curators, and educators dedicated to modeling new forms of cultural communication, creative and critical practice, and knowledge production.

metaLAB is an idea foundry in the sense that it is committed to ideation, debate, speculation, and theorization across the disciplinary grid.

metaLAB is a knowledge design lab inasmuch as it consists of a portfolio of projects that translate ideas into practical expressions, from experimental books and pamphlets to museum installations to software platforms and data visualizations to participatory events.

metaLAB is a production studio because it is committed to bringing together the mind and the hand, thinking and making. It tests out hypotheses and ideas by developing and delivering a wide array of outputs including database documentaries, software platforms, artworks, exhibitions, studio courses and workshops, data visualizations, and curatorial projects.

As an institutional unit within the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society, metaLAB is actively involved in the Center’s research efforts in such domains as artificial intelligence, social justice, internet governance, cybersecurity, and the law. metaLAB is physically located on the 4th floor of 42 Kirkland Street, within Harvard’s Graduate School of Design. Because design practice is fundamental to its ethos, metaLAB maintains close ties to GSD faculty, students, and academic programs, as well as to the Faculty of Arts and Sciences.

At metaLAB, Newman (bio) is Director of Art and Education; Matthew Battles (bio) is Director of Scholarly Initiatives.

Below, we're sharing a collection of links, to orient you to our mission and community, our team portfolio, and individual output of Newman and Matthew.

• metaLAB site (explore our overall mission, community, and project portfolio)

• Example projects:

  • Curricle & Curricle Lens (course-selection platform; curricular history of Harvard over time)

  • Curatorial A(i)gents (collaborative media gallery exhibition)

  • Machine Experience

  • Moral Labyrinth

  • Library Beyond the Book & Cold Storage

• Newman’s site (for fuller documentation of projects and practice).

• MB-adjacent stuff

  • Tree (book)

  • Earth Measurer (ML-driven art work xploring natural and technical abundance)

  • FutureFood (with Jessica Yurkofsky, Keith Hartwig, and others; social-practice engagement with foraging, cooking, and nature in the city)

Thursday, July 30 from 6pm-8pm

Session run by Lance & Lis

Some things to note and prepare for the Group Project Presentation.

Presentations Length

• It should no more than 8 minutes but will be stopped at 10 minutes (for the sake of time and respect for peers, please do not go over).

• We will have 5 minutes for questions.

• Be mindful, deliberate, and selective about what is most important for others to know about your project

• Presentations do not have to be extensive, perfect or rehearsed--share with us some interesting things that your group is doing.

Group Order of Presentations

• 1st: Isabela Ines Bernardino de Souza Silva, Isha Bhallamudi, Luisa Adib Dino, Junnan Yu

• 2nd: Raquel Esther Jorge Ricart, Chenab Navalkha, Trent Kannegieter

• 3rd: Cierra Robson, Ashley Mehra, Karen Kennedy, Luca Righetti

• 4th: Martyna Kalvaityte, Ana Qarri, Bijal Mehta

• 5th: Erika Ly, Suvradip Maitra, Colleen Chen

• 6th: Dylan Doyle-Burke, Jenny Lee, Janna Huang

• 7th: Jess Blumenthal, Moe Sunami, Lily Liu

Presentation Visuals

• You do not need to make a formal visual presentation. If you do, then you will want to use the slides provided on the Master Deck which includes the order of presentations: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1H0WI2dlr-o-vOlcZBEo6xwvubOT7XHUA_DVe8SBNZvQ/edit?usp=sharing

• Presentations should be no more than 5 slides (they can be less)

• For presentations, please do not use audio/video.

Group Presentation Channel

• I have created a Group Presentation Channel.

• Use this for specific presentation questions as we get closer.

• Also, use the Group Presentation Channel for any additional materials that you want to share with participants after the presentation.

Other BKC members will be invited to watch the presentations. If you have questions, post to the Group Presentations channel on Slack.