THE EDGE

The Edge Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2016

TECH REVOLUTION

I don't know about you, but I feel humanity is situated on the edge of the next revolution...a tech revolution. It could be an exciting future. But, then again, it may not be. 

AI and AGI - BENEFIT TO HUMANITY

Artificial intelligence is one of main areas of technological development where people are putting efforts into safeguarding benefit to humanity perspectives. The fact that emphasis is placed on benefit to humanity means there is a downside...where developments could be detrimental to humanity. Multi-disciplinary research centres like the Center of the Study of Existential Risk [CSER}at Cambridge University and the more loosely formed Future of Life Institute [Boston] [FLI] all have initiatives to conduct research into AI and AGI [artificial general intelligence ie: expansive human-like intelligence rather than task oriented] where benefit to humanity is the key driver. Then there is the recently formed Partnership on AI: to benefit people and society . The partnership is Amazon, Deep Mind, Google, Facebook, IBM and Microsoft. 

So, there are a couple of things to think about. One is the importance technology and AI developers are placing on benefit to humanity issues. The downside is acknowledged risk, which whilst small maybe irredeemable. Here, I quote from the CSER website The field of artificial intelligence is advancing rapidly along a range of fronts and while it promises tremendous benefits, a growing body of experts within and outside the field has raised concerns that future developments may represent a major technological risk. With the level of power, autonomy, and generality of AI expected to increase in coming years and decades, forward planning and research to avoid unexpected catastrophic consequences is essential.

MONEY - LAW

Another thing to think about is - money. Beneficial AI will be lucrative for some, hopefully for many. Taking risks that might see the human species incapacitated in some way or worse, potentially annihilated, is not good business! There is a financial benefit in keeping AI beneficial to humans! This, of course, erupts into a whole set of other issues concerning equitable distribution and access, monopoly players, private vs public and more. Then there are questions about how legal frameworks will keep up with the ramifications of AI, AGI, autonomous weapons etc. The law is not noted for being a fast paced institution. Will it be left behind? Will AI replace practitioners and the judiciary? How can those who think about potential legal issues eg: law academics and legislators, keep up?

THE EDGE

My painting The Edge 'speaks' to all the issues I've written about...and more. Regular readers will know of my keen interest in the development of lethal autonomous weapons [LAWS]. This kind of development is a specific case of AI being used in ways that could pose major risks. These are not just mortal risks, but also risks that will erode what it means to be human, what it means to live in community, erosion of ideas about society and civilisation. I draw your attention to an Open Letter published on the FLI website Autonomous Weapons: An Open Letter form AI and Robotics Researchers

In The Edge I have used the figure of the armed drone. Six of them are half emerged from under something...they appear to be on the edge of emergence, ready and able to seek with their wide area surveillance systems and weapons. The drone is becoming a symbol of 21st century Western power and might, a symbol of a threshold in technological prowess where machines may be equipped with an autonomy that takes us into a scifi future. The symbol of the drone is, of course, a contested one. In parts of the world experiencing the outcomes of drone attacks, the drone is a symbol of inhumanity. 

In the painting, I quite like how the drones seem to be entering an abyss-like place. It seems to fall away from the foreground. It's like the drones have fallen off the edge of a ravine or cliff - rather than emerging from something? Yet, it may not be all bad! Maybe these drones are keeping Earth safe from alien attack? Maybe they are stationed in space? Maybe the 'landscape' is a cosmic one, rather than an Earthly one? The paint has created the 'scape' seemingly on its own. 

Maybe....?????

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com 

DAMNED

Damned Gouache on paper 21 x 30 cm 2011

 

 

ENVIRONMENT IN THE 21ST CENTURY

Recently, in the news, there was a report about an abandoned silver mine near Texas in S.W Queensland on the border of New South Wales, Australia. Contaminated ponds pose risks to the local Dumaresqu River, which flows into the McIntyre River, which then flows southwards into the Murray Darling. Apparently, it only needs a minimal amount of rain to fall to cause havoc with overflow into the river systems.

 

This kind of situation is totally unacceptable, especially in the 21st century where no-one, mining companies and governments, can claim ignorance of environmental sustainability issues.

 

DAMNED

The work on paper above Damned [and detail below] was painted a few years ago, but it still 'speaks'...even 'screams' to us today. The word 'damned' is repeated to appear like water in a holding facility, such as a dam or a pond. It could also be the bed of a river or creek. Obviously I am playing with the word dam!

 

To be damned is a serious thing - conjuring an array of different possibilities from the wrath of God to condemnation, anger, frustration and denouncement. And...if we pollute and contaminate our waterways we are damned in a way that potentially threatens our very existence!

 

 

Detail Damned Gouache on paper 21 x 30 cm 2011

 

 

VALUE

The thought that human existence, along with plants and non-human animals, can be threatened by contaminated water may seem extreme, but we are all interconnected in such a way that even a small risk must be taken seriously.

 

The news report mentioned above is just one story, but there are many potential stories like it. Questions about 'value', normally referring to money, dominate debates. Who pays reparation, especially when a mine, or similar, goes into liquidation and there is no money left to maintain or fix? This is compounded when governments have requested inadequate financial assurances at planning or approval stages. While people wait for an answer it could rain and tip the water level in contaminated ponds into wider catchments with potentially devastating results. What is value and what is valued?

 

RISK

In my painting Risk [below and Detail underneath] I have painted strips of rain, water in a dam or creek/river bed, and underground aquifers in small blue $ signs. The word 'Risk' is also painted in small $ signs, but the colour red signals a warning, perhaps multiple warnings, about how we value money, water, life and existence.

 

Risk is not a condemnation of money as a symbol of exchange. Rather, it is a provocation to think about the many aspects of value.

 

CURRENCY

And, there's a play with notions of currency! The currency of water as it ebbs and flows, a system of money in use in a country, being current - contemporary, implied momentum within a system such as political currency.

 

Maybe if we take risk seriously - currency in all its permutations will be re-negotiated, re-imagined even?

 

 

 

Risk Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2010 [Sold]

 

 

 

 Detail Risk Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2010 [Sold]

 

 

LANDSCAPE

The two paintings above Damned and Risk are landscapes - loaded ones! Regular readers know of my love of landscape and my attempts to re-think what landscape is in the 21st century. I have my cosmic landscape which try to untether notions of landscape from Earth-bound horizons. I also have my Earth-based ones, such as the two above. Yet, the link is imaging the future...

 

 

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

CURRENCY

Murray Darling Currency Oil on linen 120 x 160 cm

Click on the image to make it larger.

This latest painting Murray Darling Currency falls into my 'quiet activist' work. It is political, although not initially overtly political. However, as the viewer ponders the painting, and notices various elements, commentary on issues surrounding the Murray Darling Basin/catchment is obvious. Check out this site for information on the importance of the Murray Darling Basin for Australian agriculture and water [obviously both related issues]. http://www.murrayriver.com.au/about-the-murray/murray-darling-basin/

This new painting follows a work on paper, by the same title, which I painted last year.

                                      Murray Darling Currency Gouache on paper 52 x 63 cm [framed]

                                      http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2010/11/murray-darling-currency.html

In both paintings the area of the Murray Darling Basin is painted with small blue $ signs to pose questions of value, all kinds of 'value'. The word 'currency' in the title deliberately plays with its many meanings, from water flow, to money, to contemporaneousness and political currency. The viewer does not discern the small $ sign when looking at the painting from a distance. They become evident as the viewer moves closer. This is a deliberate 'tactic' on my part to ask, 'Have you noticed?' Issues surrounding water supply and management, food production, soil nutrient sustainability, farmer returns, mining impacts, social cohesion, regional development and more all play their part in the life of the Murray Darling Basin.

In both the oil and the work on paper the 'landscape' is created with my much loved tree-of-life motif. In each case the tree spills out from the bottom left to cascade into land and sea. In the oil painting I have painted the continent of Australia depicting rainfall areas ie: the darker the green the more rainfall. The tree-of-life is a perfect life symbol as it denotes systems which give and propel life. Just as the body's vascular system propels life, the earth's water systems also propel life. The Murray Darling Basin is a perfect example of a life giving and propelling water system. When understood as a life system, like a vascular one, then questions of value take on a different perspective...don't they?

The work on paper Murray Darling Currency will be in my exhibition 'Paradise' opening next week 9th September in Melbourne [details below]. I will have a few of my 'quiet activist' paintings in the exhibition as triggers to pose questions about environmental degradation and concepts of paradise lost. Indeed, what if THIS is paradise and human quests to seek paradise eleswhere 'out there' blind us to the paradise of here and now?

The new large oil painting  Murray Darling Currency will not be in the exhibition as I just finished it. All the paintings for 'Paradise' went off to Melbourne on Monday.

PARADISE

Exhibition Dates: 8 September - 8 October

Purgatory Artspace

170 Abbotsford St, North Melbourne

Tuesday - Saturday 11 am - 5 pm

purgatoryartspace@gmail.com

03 9329 1800

http://www.artabase.net/exhibition/3275-paradise

ARTICLE   ARTICLE   ARTICLE   ARTICLE

AND Please read this wonderful article Carolyn McDowall from 'thecultureconcept circle' wrote about my work and 'Paradise'. http://www.thecultureconcept.com/circle/paradise-in-purgatory-kathryn-brimblecombe-fox-finding-light

SYMPOSIUM AT UQ

On Tuesday and Wednesday this week I attended a fascinating symposium at the University of Queensland. The symposium  was called:

Virtual Anatomies: The Cultural Impact of New Medical Imaging Technologies

http://www.ched.uq.edu.au/index.html?page=159754&pid=40622

Regular readers of my BLOG will probably know why such a symposium interests me. Over many years many scientists and doctors have asked if I have had medical or scientific training because they see vascular or reproductive systems in my work. Sometimes my trees look like brains or kidneys, cross sections of tissue or cells. [I have no medical or scientific training other than senior biology!] Yet, these same shapes, cross sections and so on can also take on landscape qualities, such as aerial views of water systems or mountain ranges, cross sections of land and so on. The body as site and site as body are the things that interest me. Even beyond the boundaries of earth...body as cosmos, cosmos as body. As regular readers know, I sometimes take the tree-of-life into the cosmos, to help find its roots in the beginning of time, as well as to reveal its symbolic potency in the 21st century.

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimbelcombe-fox.com