How does a machine learn to read the world? Testimonies and screen recordings introduce the experience of online micro-workers from the Global South: their job is to teach the AI of self-driving cars to navigate the streets of the Global North.
Consisting of screen recordings from online workers whose task is to break down and index real images so that they can be recognized by autonomous cars in wealthy countries, THEIR EYES confronts the invisibility of their work with the inherent hypervisibility of the activity they perform. By labelling and carefully drawing the outlines of people, curbs, traffic signs, leaves, bushes, etc. these workers are not simply using their eyes to look more closely – they are experiencing, by proxy, realities from countries they are yet to visit, often blocked out of, for economic reasons, but also because of aggressive immigration policies. In an era when we look only at screens but have forgotten what lies on the other side of them, Nicolas Gourault’s film makes the reverse effort, seeking out the “out of sight” and investigating the lack of transparency of new labour in the digital age, as well as exploitation in techno-capitalism. (Dora Leu)
Nicolas Gourault is an artist and filmmaker based in Paris with a background in visual arts and visual studies. He has worked with Forensic Architecture before graduating from Le Fresnoy, Studio national des arts contemporains. His work navigates between online open-source investigations and the critical use of new media as documentary tools.
