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PROUSTMACHINE
PROUSTMACHINE, 1994
artificial neural network, news feeds of Austria Press Agency, computer, dot matrix printer, dimensions variable
software: Peter Riedlsperger
exhibition view Tausch des Öffentlichen, Bregenzer Kunstverein, 1994

In the space of the Bregenzer Kunstverein, Magazin 4, a computer system was installed for a period of 240 hours, which was connected to the Austria Press Agency in Vienna via a data line. About every two minutes agency reports were transmitted and processed by an artificial neural network. The neural network was trained by Marcel Proust‘s novel "In Search of Lost Time.“ The software rewrote the news reports in the linguistic structure of Proust to generate a current novel in real time as a chronometer of social life. Proust's thesis that we lose time through media consumption was realized under the condition of posthuman authorship. Human reading and machinic writing diverged, generating thousands of pages every day.