Modelling Identities

This project is a research experiment looking at the potential dangers arising from machine-learning algorithms and AI in the fields of surveying, data analytics, and surveillance, and their threats to marginalized communities. More particularly, it explores how advancements in feature-extraction methods and identity-recognition software can be used as oppressive tools of control and surveillance by institutions of power on minoritized bodies and how those can impact their perceived sense of self and safety.

Taking the form of a sort of self-portrait series, this project consists of a multitude of photographs of various and decontextualized body parts uploaded to a photogrammetry software to construct a 3D digital version of myself.

By deleting and altering photos, manipulating the data and experimenting with the software, I want to see the ways in which I can alter the 3D models and express how identity goes beyond palpable, measurable, and bodily parameters – biometrics. Opaquely defined and ambiguous, plural and fluid, the queer identity that I will try to represent here is my aim at rejecting the current definition of ‘identity-recognition’ and its oppressive implications.