“Híbrides” is a three-day biennial organized by the Axolot.cat collective, in collaboration with the DARTS (Design, Art, Technology, and Society) research group at the UOC (Open University of Catalonia), with the aim of promoting the creation of an artistic community that shares concerns regarding the critical use of technological tools and methodologies in their research, practices, and contexts.

Through lectures, experimental performances, concerts, and art installations, the biennial offers a space for collective reflection where small-scale databases and embodied experiences serve as critical methodologies in addressing the ethical, sustainability, hegemony, and privacy debates surrounding various digital and artificial intelligence technologies.

The program of activities is organized through an open call, complemented by a curatorial selection of artists and thinkers related with two guiding concepts:

Small Data Sets

Data is the central element in training models and automating specific tasks within the paradigms of machine learning and artificial intelligence. However, data is a sociotechnical construction: we define what to measure and collect data mediated by existing technologies. Data is therefore shaped by a prior intention about what to measure and why. For us, small data involves defining, from the perspective of an individual or a community, what things one wants to measure, for what purpose, and which algorithms or methodologies will be used to analyze the information.

Embodiment

Embodiment is a concept approached from multiple perspectives. We propose engaging with it by considering bodily experience as the process through which we exist and make sense of the world around us, the foundation of a knowledge that is produced in and through the body. Thinking about embodiment invites us to recognize knowledge as situated and sensory, not anchored solely in language or thought, and to bring perception, emotions, biographical trajectories, experiences, and individual perspectives into artistic and scientific research processes. For us, to inquire into the body and embodiment is to ask ourselves from which experiences we come to know and to research.

The first edition was held in November 2024 and you can visit the website and documentation here: 2024-hibrides.axolot.cat

The second edition central topic is “Classification”, and will take place from November 26 to 28, 2026. More info: hibrides.axolot.cat

Stay tuned!

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Video-summary by: Miquel Martinez