Roy Ascott: Technology, Shamanism and Higher Order Consciousness 

Roy Ascott will give a talk about his work enlightening his theories of technology and consciousness followed by a facilitated discussion.

Ascott's groundbreaking artwork employed cybernetics and technology as a means to explore systems and distributed authorship, prefiguring Facebook by some 20 years. He could be said to have anticipated the impact of such systems on our political and sociological structures — think of the recent Twitter vs super-injunction clash.

Through this work Ascott developed a highly tuned theoretical standpoint on how technology alters consciousness for the individual and for society. He coined phrases such as 'moist media' to explore the collapse of the biological and information divides while re-applying the term syncretism to explain our experience of multiple realities at once.

Ascott sees technology as a means for individuals to explore pre-conceptions of themselves, to enter separate realities and bring back information. A computer can therefore be likened to undertaking a similar role to that of a shaman in accessing different levels of consciousness.

Some may say this is utopian but at the heart of Ascott's vision is the role of the artist in challenging and reshaping our concept of reality and of life itself.