Panopticon by Barak Chamo

Panopticon

He is seen, but he does not see; he is the object of information, never a subject in communication.

— Michel Foucault

Through the interactive video sculpture, Panopticon, we create an experience for audience to be both the "observed" and the "observer" - it’s an alienated moment for them to be both themselves, a real person in real life, and the others, a bunch of data in the database, at the same time.

It is a critique and a wakeup call to the alarming prevalence of mass surveillance all around us, to how tracking and surveillance devices have become largely invisible to us, and to how insensitive we have become toward privacy invasion.

In the age of mass surveillance and commoditized information, we are all, willingly or not, constantly watched. Our devices, online presence, transaction history, and even physical presence have become an asset for the social network, world governments, and corporations to own - we live in a digital panopticon devoid of consent and, in many cases, even awareness. As in Bentham’s architecture, the watchman’s all-seeing eye keeps us from misstepping and policing ourselves. The all-seeing eyes of the machine are now hiding inside the digital system, unconsciously monitoring and disciplining its life-long prisoners - the internet users.

Inspired by the system of control of the same name, we created the project “Panopticon”, an interactive media sculpture that breaks the illusions of privacy and control of our digital identity and physical presence. Multiple camera rigs monitor audience throughout the exhibition space, tracking and capturing faces, and collecting their facial data to be projected on a semi-torus sculpture.