LO 04 – What do machines sing of?

“What do machines sing of?” is an art piece by Martin Backes, an artist, technologist, and self-described hacker. The piece consists of a microphone placed in front of a standing computer monitor that uses a computer program to reproduce popular ballads from the 1990s. It was created in 2015.

I chose this piece because it deals with voice and language in an interesting way. The piece raises questions about the increasing capability of technology to perform inherently human tasks, but it also says something about our capacity to personify technology. While the program works to imitate a human voice through blatantly digital sounds, our perceptions work to interpret those sounds as such; thus, the program and the viewer work together to create the music.