Cybersounds unfolds paradigmatic moments of cybernetic thinking throughout history, politics, financial models, and cultural phenomena. From the Bolshevik proto-cybernetic in pre-revolutionary Russia through the post-cybernetic hippie movement to digital capitalism: this podcast series thematizes the emergence of meta-sciences, the appropriation of feedback systems, and the creation of models for the anticipation of systemic risk. From the Russian avant-garde and the Vienna Circle through cybernetic tunes in pop music to Glitch Feminism: Cybersounds mirrors the universalist agenda of cybernetics as well as the pervasiveness of its transdisciplinary promise.

Throughout seven episodes Carolin Melia Brendel, Rebecca Fuxen and Martin Rovan, Tizia Grether, Simon Nagy, Kervin Saint-Pere, Lia Sudermann, and Andrea Zabric expand the artistic and discursive fields of the exhibition Cybernetics of the Poor.

Cybersounds is a cooperation between Kunsthalle Wien and students of the Master in Critical Studies at the Academy of Fine Arts of Vienna.

Cybersounds

“TheraPsy is a special software for psychotherapy—Thera with Th like therapy, not like Terra: Earth, even if TerraPsy were a much better fit, since the Earth, i.e., Gaia, or, better, THE BLUE PLANET and the SELF, which is worked on in therapy, came into being at the same time after all.”

Lia Sudermann’s podcast is about feedback as a group dynamic therapy method, about self-responsibility and guilt, about the power of now, and about what the conquest of the self has to do with the conquest of outer space.

Lia Sudermann: Cybernetics and Hippies

“Become your avatar. Be the glitch.”

In her "Glitch Feminism Manifesto", artist and theorist Legacy Russell examines strategies of avatar creation for their emancipatory content. For her, glitch not only means “to slip” or “to slide” but also refers to a feedback loop process between the real and the virtual. Tizia Grether’s podcast links Russell’s theses with Adrian Piper’s iconic alter ego “Mythic Being” whose interpretation as an avatar puts categories of class, race, gender, and sexuality up for discussion. This raises the question to what degree this artistic practice can represent a resistant cybernetics of the poor.

A special thanks to the Adrian Piper Research Archive Foundation in Berlin for the permission to use the video "The Mythic Being" and to Legacy Russell for letting me use excerpts from her "Glitch Feminism Video Essay."
Audio-Excerpts from: 
Legacy Russell, Glitch Feminism Video Essay, 2018 (minutes in podcast: 3:02-3:46, 6:19-6:45, 7:43-7:50, 14:08-14:13). 

Adrian Piper, The Mythic Being, 1973. Video, 00:08:00. Excerpted segment from the film Other Than Art's Sake by the artist Peter Kennedy. Detail: audio excerpts of video-fragment found at: http://www.adrianpiper.com/vs/video_tmb.shtml. Collection of the Adrian Piper Research Archive (APRA) Foundation Berlin. © APRA Foundation Berlin. 

Quotes from: 
Legacy Russell, Glitch Feminism Manifesto, Verso, 2020 and Uri McMillan, Embodied Avatars Genealogies of Black Feminist Art and Performance, NYU Press, 2015.

Sound fragments from NASA:
Sounds of Perseverance Mars Rover Driving – Sol 16 (90-second highlights) found at: https://www.nasa.gov/specials/sounds/FILTERED%20HIGHLIGHTS%20-%20Sol16RoverDriveHighlights.wav 

First Audio Recording of Sounds on Mars found at https://www.nasa.gov/specials/sounds/SCAM_MIC_SOL001_RUN001.wav 

Mercury 6: God Speed found at: https://www.nasa.gov/mp3/582368main_Mercury-6_God-Speed.mp3 
Text and conception: Tizia Grether
Read by Larissa Smurago

Tizia Grether: Become your avatar. Be the glitch.

Alexander Bogdanov designed a Bolshevik proto-cybernetics in the run-up to the October Revolution of 1917. This proto-cybernetics found its expression in experiments with reciprocal blood transfusion, cybercommunist science fiction novels, the Proletcult movement, and a metascience called tectology. 

Axel Stockburger and Simon Nagy talk about the relationship of Bogdanov’s theory to later cybernetics and about the political insights that may be gained above all from their differences.

Simon Nagy & Axel Stockburger: Red Cybernetics

Michael Simku and Carolin Melia Brendel discuss the ambivalent relationship between cybernetics and digital capitalism. They talk about Carolin Melia Brendel's research in finance sociology on the conjuncture of cybernetic risk models in so-called times of crisis as well as her artistic research practice and her latest video work "the gaze and the machine" (2020).

Carolin Melia Brendel: Cybernetics of the Rich

"Cold Crystal Timbres" recalls the immediate past. Hight-tech emotions and synthetic unnaturalness: When sonic hybridities were echoing early 2000s pop.

Once a haven for nerds and enthusiasts, the internet became accessible to many in the early 2010s. Utopias linked to the early internet, such as that of an anonymous and democratic cyberspace, are finally being displaced by a neoliberal Silicon Valley ideology that manifests itself in platforms like Facebook and Amazon.

Rebecca Fuxen and Martin Rovan’s mixtape "Cold Crystal Timbres" pays tribute to the music that emerged from this structural change and aesthetically relates to it. This hybrid music genre, which developed between 2010 and 2015, is characterized by both cold digital sounds and nostalgic pop references. It is embedded in collectives, loose associations, labels, events, or curatorial projects that network primarily through platforms such as SoundCloud and Myspace. Although this music takes place mostly in traditional club settings, it is transnational, digital networking practices that create political activism and solidarity: many collectives establish platforms for DJs, producers, and activists. They reclaim the white- and male-dominated club scene and emphasize the queer context of its genesis and the central role of BPoC within club music.

Listening to the digital, high-resolution sounds of the time one comes to grasp the intersections of digital everyday culture and music as well as the influence that technological developments have on the realities of the artists’ lives.


Credits:
Mixtape by Rebecca Fuxen & Martin Rovan
fkoff1963 - everytime
Rabit - Hex [Tri Angle Records]
boygirl - YE SLOW
Celestial Trax - Secrets [Purple Tape Pedigree]
Blastah - Fica [Mäss]
Sami Baha - Chunk [Planet Mu]
Retina Set - I've Got Feelings Too
SOPHIE - Not Okay [Future Classic]
Lotic - PHLEGM (ZZ GOLOSO EDIT) [NAAFI]
Toxe - Let Me Thru [STAYCORE]
Resla - Nitro [STAYCORE]
Lechuga Zafiro - Agua y Puerta [NAAFI]
MikeQ - The Ha Dub Rewerk'd [Fade To Mind]
Mechatok - Placer [STAYCORE]
Dat Oven - Icy Lake (Total Freedom Remix) [Fade To Mind & Night Slugs]
Toxe x Aaliyah (v1984 edit) [BUILD]

Rebecca Fuxen & Martin Rovan: Cold Crystal Timbres, Mixtape

The Kunsthalle Wien Podcast offers you an illuminating excursion into our current exhibitions by going above and beyond the opening hours of the space with more background information and reflections on artworks, particular curatorial aspects, as well as sharing some funny anecdotes. In discussions with artists, curators and visitors, you'll hear interesting stories and get an insight into the concept of the exhibition in focus – so tune in and listen!