IOCOSE (2014)
In Times of Peace: Drone+Â
The life of a drone after war and terror
We are happy to present Drone+, the first part of the series âIn Times of Peaceâ.
Drone+ is video documentation of a drone attempting to run a 100
meters race and recording its own activity through the mobile app Nike+. The drone has been running the same race for one month, producing data regarding its own speed, time and covered distance. However, while it successfully
crossed the finishing line most of the time, it also sometimes failed.
The reasons for its failure were mostly technical, or related to the
weather conditions. Successful races occurred occasionally, but never showing
signs of improvement.
Drone+ is part of the âIn Times of Peaceâ project by the collective IOCOSE.
âIn Times of Peaceâ intends to explore the life of a drone after war and terror.
What would a drone do if war and terror were over?
Magazines such as Wired, or websites such as
diydrones.com, would
probably argue that drones can be used in everyday contexts. Drones
can be used to check the roof of a house or to deliver Amazon orders.
However, this is still a very instrumental perspective on drones, one
where drones are used for a specific purpose. Instead, IOCOSE intends to
ask a different question: what is the life of a drone in times of
peace? What is the creative potential of a drone, a part from the
things we could do with it? Indeed, drones do not have such a thing as
a âlifeâ. But what if?
Drone+ documents the presence of signs of life: unpredictable and
imperfect results that are subject to the contingent and particular
events emerging from being in contact with the environment and being
composed of unstable (and cheap) materials. Bringing these activities
to the fore, in a sense, creates a different if not opposed narrative
to the instrumental and deterministic perspective replicated
in contexts such as Wired magazine, and many others. While those
narratives tend to consider the general and abstract use of drones, IOCOSE
looks at the specific events of a drone's life, as it happens day by
day.
The _expression_ âin times of peaceâ is a reference to Paul Virilio's
theory of logistics (in Paul Virilio and Sylvere Lotringer, Pure War, 1983, Semiotext(e) / Foreign Agents). Virilio, quoting a text by the Pentagon from the late '40s, notes how logistics was there defined as the procedure following which a nation's potential is transferred to its armed forces, 'in times of peace' as in times of war. But what does it mean to live 'in times of peace'? and what does it mean for a drone? This is indeed a difficult question to answer, as we have no clue on how we would live in times of peace ourselves, and how those times could possibly look like.
As âtimes of peaceâ are becoming a strategic condition for the temporary deployment of technologies and ideologies developed in times of war, IOCOSE looks at the life of a drone in search of answers.
Artist bio:
IOCOSE is a collective of four artists. The group explores possible futures and alternative interpretations of media and technologies. IOCOSE organizes actions in order to subvert ideologies, practices, processes of identification and production of meanings. It uses pranks and hoaxes as tactical means, as joyful and sound tools. The groupâs work has been exhibited in several institutions and festivals including the Venice Biennale, Tate Modern, FACT in Liverpool, Jeu de Paume in Paris and the Science Gallery in Dublin.
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paolo - IOCOSE
http://iocose.org