Staying with the fatigue

Very few things, in these times of mass production and "algorithmic reproducibility”, have changed as much as artistic creation has. Is it still possible today, as artists, to follow inspiration, to avoid the influence of the algorithm? Musician Alberto "Bebo" Guidetti and writer Espérance Hakuzwimana view the problem from two different perspectives, and yet both get to a similar answer: take a step back, and make space for the analog world.

In a discussion moderated by journalist and writer Lorenzo Fantoni, the two artists examine ways to stay ahead of this fast-changing creative landscape. Both feel that their work is now less important than their online presence, and every single gesture is scrutinised and thoroughly investigated. Their public posture defines them, turning their actions into “positional cultural goods”.

How do you fight the risk of falling into “influ-activism” – that hybrid digital culture where online influence culture merges with digital activism? Hakuzwimana has a simple but clear answer: staying with the fatigue. Where “fatigue” is the “real world”, the offline one. “We have to get dirty with soil, not to lose touch with reality.”

Hakuzwimana is a reluctant activist. “I always wanted to be a writer, and all the writers I knew were dead. So I just assumed I was going to write a manuscript, and die before seeing it published”. But a time came – she refers to the Macerata shootings – when she just could not stay silent. In the aftermath of that decision, she has to deal with the expectations of those who now look at her hoping for simple answers to impossible questions.

Guidetti adds another perspective: it’s not easy to maintain agency within a “coercive system”, but we must not lose hope. Optimism, then, becomes a raison d'être for artists who want to participate in, rather than run from, the world.

One last practical weapon against the algorithm and its evil?

Bookstores, libraries, physical shops, where you can encounter “something you didn’t know you wanted”. Turning off the algorithm to rediscover what you truly desire.