Conversations on a Cross-Town Algorithm free matinee

The National Sculpture Factory in association with Cork Midsummer Festival are delighted to present the premiere of Doireann O’Malley’s new work Conversations on a Crosstown Algorithm.

The 3D-Theatre Play, Conversations on a Crosstown Algorithm (2022), is the first iteration of Doireann O’Malley’s new work co-commissioned by National Sculpture Factory and based on a long-term artistic research project commissioned by Berliner Förderprogramm Künstlerische Forschung in 2020/21.

The immersive 3D-animation, which adopts the narrative structure of three-act plays, centers around a conversation between two characters, Samantha & Olda Wiser—performed by Mathea Hoffmann and Juan Carlos Cuadrado. The two, sheer strangers when the play starts, slowly but surely dive into each other’s life stories, traumata, dreams, and nightmares, at times mirrored others counteracted by changing oneiric surroundings. Drawing on psycho-analytical motives derived from collaborative character development workshops, the dialogue soon reveals itself as one part of a larger systemic virus.

At a time of overlapping crises, Conversations on a Crosstown Algorithm invites to reconsider the relationship between nature and technology by looking into new forms of queer subjectivity and their entanglements with data economy, artificial intelligence, and identity politics. With references to surveillance architectures and computational networks, the scene is predominantly set in a virtual chatroom, reminiscent of an abandoned data centre, or an empty casino, in which the queer protagonists seem to find themselves trapped. Mimicking archetypical spaces for accumulation and reward through systems of conditioning and reinforcement, the setting calls into question psychological disorders and malfunctioning processes which the desiring machines of capitalism only accelerate. Where is the exit, what is waiting outside, if there is an any?

Doireann O’Malley (born 1981 in Limerick, IE) is a multidisciplinary artist based in Berlin. Their research- led practice unites collaborative methodologies, healing and reparative movement, writing, and theory, with a strong technological emphasis on new media, virtual Reality, 3D and film installation.

O’Malley holds an MFA from University of Ulster in Belfast, UK. From 2021- 2022 held the position of Professor of Gender Space at Akademie der bildenden Künste Wien. They were a research fellow at the Berliner Förderprogramm Künstlerische Forschung (2020-2021) and a participant of the BPA// Berlin programme for artists (2019-2020). They acted as a guest mentor on the The Live Arts MA / AdBK Nuremberg (2001)