Who Are I: A Generative Self-Portrait of my Algorithmic Identity, as defined by a Surveillance Capitalist

Maximilian Klein

Nowadays human generated data is an economic resource, a playground for quantitative social network analysis, classification and algorithmic profiling. Individuals today are no longer defined only by their declaration of self-identification – they are also a representation of their data, interpreted and transformed into proprietary bodies of ‘Measurable Types’ which have their own histories, rationales, and politics, detached from individual, social contexts.

‘Who Are I’ is an installation that transforms the artist’s personal user classifications, as defined by Google’s Ads Personalization, into a generative self-portrait that prompts reflection on the genesis of algorithmic identities in today’s networked societies. In a large-scale video installation, the artist presents fragmented portraits of individuals that have never existed – faces generated through Artificial Neural Networks – that form disembodied visual metaphors for networked systems of identity formation, applied to all aspects of digital life.

Each portrait fragment represents a single vector within a complex, multi-dimensional, identity determining latent space. A recognizable portrait is only visible when viewing the accumulation of all pieces: it is all of them at once and yet none of them. Always somewhere in the space in-between, stuck in dimensions that cannot be comprehended and upon which there is no influence or control, the figures depicted perpetually shift in a constant, mutative flow of data.


About
Max is a multi-disciplinary designer and graduated architect based in NYC. His recent work focuses on the philosophical, political, and social dimensions of computation and explores the aesthetic and cultural implications of our increasingly technology-driven societies.

In the past, Max worked with leading design and architectural firms such as IDEO and Zaha Hadid Architects, and developed products for clients such as Spotify, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Mercedes Benz, and San Diego Zoo.
Max is a multi-disciplinary designer and graduated architect based in NYC. His recent work focuses on the philosophical, political, and social dimensions of computation and explores the aesthetic and cultural implications of our increasingly technology-driven societies.

In the past, Max worked with leading design and architectural firms such as IDEO and Zaha Hadid Architects, and developed products for clients such as Spotify, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Mercedes Benz, and San Diego Zoo.
Thesis Faculty
Richard The
Anna Harsanyi
Katherine Moriwaki
Jamie Keiles
Welcome to Guestbook, a procedurally-generated story of togetherness, built during the intensely digital Spring of 2020.