AI Democracy
Photo: Alexandre Silveira
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In AI DEMOCRACY, we explore the tension between artificial intelligence and democratic processes: Who makes decisions? Who has access to which data? Whose voice counts? Following CHATBOT CHALLENGE, our performative engagement with AI in the theater, we now shift our focus to political spaces—spaces that must be renegotiated and remeasured through the lens of AI. In a playful dialogue, two performers interact with AI systems specifically developed and trained by Interrobang. The audience plays a central role: through live contributions, hand gestures, or smartphone input, they actively shape the political agenda of the evening. In interactive test and play settings, the proposed topics are developed further, sharpened, discussed—or pushed to the absurd.
From housing policy and social polarization to climate change, AI enables a rapid acceleration of political opinion-building. But are decisions made with its help truly well-founded? Should we place our trust in seemingly neutral super-algorithms, or should human performers be given more responsibility? The audience, acting as a micro-society, explores and experiences AI politics in real time. As AI undergoes rapid evolutionary leaps, its political influence multiplies: surveillance software by Palantir expands state monitoring, a Federal Ministry for Digital Affairs and Transport has been established, and there are already initial attempts to support political decision-making using AI systems. At the same time, deepfakes are becoming more realistic, and both targeted disinformation bots and unintended AI “hallucinations” increasingly endanger democratic processes and institutions.
Alongside these urgent challenges, AI DEMOCRACY also seeks to explore the opportunities and potential of AI for democratic participation through performance. While algorithmically steered social media platforms have so far mainly amplified political polarization, AI applications like “Crowd Smart” are testing new communicative processes for finding shared perspectives and agendas. In collaboration with our creative coding team, we aim to develop new tools for the theater space, and to reprogram, hack, repurpose, and evolve existing AI technologies. With AI DEMOCRACY, we continue and expand our long-standing artistic engagement with the processes of digital society. Artificial intelligence is not an inevitable fate, but a technology shaped by humans and open to political regulation. In this piece, we aim to empower the audience to experience, reflect on, and actively co-create AI systems within the theatrical space. Theater—as an art of assembly and participatory experimentation—proves to be a particularly fitting framework for testing, exploring, and challenging the intertwined democratic processes of human and non-human agents.
Credits
Concept: Interrobang (Till Müller-Klug & Nina Tecklenburg) Play Devising: Interrobang & Team Performance: Lukas Jakob Huber, Claudia Splitt, Künstliche Intelligenzen Dramaturgy: Anna Krauß, Lara Domke Creative Coding & Video: Manus Nijhoff, Alexandre Silveira, Julia Elger Stage: Sandra Fox Music: Friedrich Greiling Graphics: Jürgen Fehrmann Technical Direction & Lightning Design: Dirk Lutz Production Management: ehrliche arbeit – freies Kulturbüro, Sandra Klöss Collaboration Production: Lara Domke Company Management, Communication & Social Media: Jack Willenbacher PR: Tina Ebert.
A co-production with HAU Hebbel am Ufer, Berlin. Funded by the Hauptstadtkulturfonds.