Massive Attack, known for embedding pro-justice commentary into their music and art, have transformed their concert stage into satirical take on surveillance technology. Designed for their latest run of shows, with creative collaborators United Visual artists (UVA), the stage visuals create the unsettling illusion that audience members are being watched, tracked and harvested by invisible systems. By combining custom-made facial recognition software with the stage, the stage screens are populated with visuals that pick-out audience members in real time, displaying data about them.
The installation surrounds the stage with vast LED displays, dynamic typography and streams of real-time information. Faces appear to be scanned, data cascades across screens and algorithmically generated content shifts throughout the performance, blurring the line between entertainment and surveillance. The creative intent as shared by UVA is to confront audiences with a provocative question: in a world increasingly governed by data, who is really watching whom?
The work continues a creative partnership between Massive Attack and UVA that stretches back to the band’s 2003 100th Window tour. Over the years, the collaborators have explored themes ranging from censorship and net neutrality to corporate power, misinformation and the politics of war. Their latest visual language reflects growing concerns about artificial intelligence, facial recognition and the erosion of privacy in the information age.
