ALGO-RHYTHM
"Scintillating pixel data dust - used for algorithmic electioneering to enforce authoritarian, anti-
democratic policies - an electrifying, genre defying hip hop musical against automated propaganda"
ZONTA Award - Jury Statement, 65th Kurzfilmfest Oberhausen
a film by
MANU LUKSCH
PRESS FOLDER
[Link]/project/algo-rhythm
SYNOPSIS
Convenience, not choice. Efficiency, not freedom. Frictionless experience.
film still ALGO-RHYTHM
In marketing and the retail sector, data analytics is widely used to profile and micro-target
consumers and to predict behaviour. The ultimate goal, apparently, is for humans to be able
to outsource all decision-making to machine intelligence (make Google do it!). What is at
stake within the political realm?
ALGO-RHYTHM , shot in Dakar with the participation of leading Senegalese musicians,
poets and graffiti artists, probes the insidious but comprehensive threats to human rights and
agency posed by the rise of the quantification and algorithmic management of daily
life. Using hiphop, drama, street art and data-driven filmmaking, the work explores how our
embrace of the convenience of machine intelligence, refracted through the slick interface of
smartphone apps, makes us vulnerable to manipulation by political actors. Recognising the
urgent need for a new visual language to illuminate this concern, Manu Luksch collaborated
closely with Jack Wolf and Mukul Patel to develop a hybrid narrative form that unites
photogrammetry and volumetric filmmaking with traditional approaches. Through its auratic
and poetic use of computational imaging technologies, ALGO-RHYTHM scrutinizes the
limitations, errors and abuses of algorithmic representations.
FILM DESCRIPTION
The data analysis firm Cambridge Analytica recently set off multiple scandals. The firm was
credited with an important role in the election outcome in the U.S. (presidential election
2016) and in England (Brexit referendum). Users of digital networks were deliberately
targeted with disinformation and inflammatory propaganda on the basis of illegally gathered
personal data. Surfacing in ALGO-RHYTHM is a firm called Data Analytica, which
generalizes the corresponding principle: nowadays, elections are won by algorithmizing
campaigns rather than buying votes. Manu Luksch situates this process in her film in a
surprising location: Senegal is considered one of the most successful African democracies in
which politically-engaged Hip Hop, in the role of watch dog, has had continued success in
mobilizing resistance to the abuses of power.
In ALGO-RHYTHM, the West-African country becomes a perfect example of future
confrontations regarding political representation and decision making. Two candidates for the
office of president face Mr. X from Data Analytica, who is advertising his methods. The
discourse occurs in the form of a rap or a rap battle. Luksch lets a political landscape arise
that also includes traditional figures (a Griot woman) and the people. The form of the
exchange is rhymed, language advanced by digitally syncopated beats. In the background of
the image, what is being talked about is obvious the entire time: Mr. X, the Aladdin of data
analysis lets reality crumble into data bytes. Manu Luksch acts out the data maneuver with
aerial shots and other landscape images, which at a different level also take place with the
networks (with the “drugs of the nation”): in a cloud of selection, photogrammetric and other
information-logic-based picture image processes dismantle the old (political) world of
analogue representation, that is, voting and representation of the political body. (Bert Rehandl
for sixpack film)
Translation: Lisa Rosenblatt
INTERVIEW WITH MANU LUKSCH
Questions: Cornelia Prior
(excerpt. first published in Substrand 10/01/2019)
How do you chose your subject matters?
I am motivated by the questions I am asked by my surroundings. It begins when I stumble
across something that’s becoming part of our daily lives by promising convenience or
efficiency, but which has a concealed mission or function. Questions and doubts grow, and
there’s a thread to unravel. Google search is an obvious example – it’s now seen as a basic
utility, but under the hood it’s a tool of mass network surveillance. A smartphone is also a
psychometric analysis device and health sensor that plays a huge role in the classification and
commodification of personal data. A lot of my concerns revolve around how such
technologies are interwoven with individual lives and material space, and how this impacts
notions of freedom, autonomy, and privacy.
While you’re in residence at Somerset House Studios you’re producing a tactical fiction film
— can you tell me more about the term tactical fiction.
‘Tactical’ thinking, the little sister of ‘strategy’ operates during the very situation it searches
to affect, it employs the means available in that moment, translates the critique into
intervention, reclaims participation and exercises direct democracy. Fictionalization of a
situation provides the necessary distance from the all too familiar, and allows for thought
experiments to be imaginatively scaled up and elaborated, eventually even provides the
means for them to be reabsorbed back into real life.
What appeals to you about that?
Tactical fiction is a powerful artistic strategy for rethinking the status quo, inviting a wider
audience into it. By creating myths and tales around existing objects, processes or
environments, we can provoke and share visions of alternative futures. It’s a great way for
creatively challenging what we find less than perfect in our world, for combining the political
with the imaginary. We need to properly grasp our situation – the environment that we take
for granted – and playing the concepts of ‘fiction’ and ‘document’ off against each other
helps to do this. In my latest work, for example, I use this approach to highlight the
contradictions of informational capitalism and expose its faultlines.
What is your latest project?
I’m working with hip hop artists in Senegal to develop a musical installation about
algorithmic electioneering, such as the psychometric micro-targeting carried out by
Cambridge Analytica during election campaigns in the US, Kenya and Nigeria, and the
‘Brexit’ referendum in Britain. Although Cambridge Analytica collapsed following public
exposure of their practices in the mainstream media, and Facebook, which was also
implicated, issued a pathetic apology, there hasn’t been a drastic change in regulation or
oversight, and elections around the world are still vulnerable to such interference.
I sought a collaboration with rappers because of the tradition of performing political critique
from the earliest days of hip hop, and even further back, to the traditional Senegalese
recitation of Tassou (which also features in the work).
In the 2011 elections in Senegal, then president Abdoulaye Wade wanted to extend his term
by changing the constitution that sets a limit of two presidential terms. The hip hop
community were crucial in the formation of the political movement Y’En A Marre (“Fed
Up”), taking the message to the streets and mobilising resistance.
And now that Wade isn’t president…?
There has already been protest in advance of the 2019 election, because of a new law that
requires candidates to collect supporting signatures of one percent of registered voters in each
of Senegal’s regions, which forecloses the opportunity for minor candidates to run, let alone
win.
These musicians act as a kind of unbribable watchdog, who don’t get co-opted but keep
scrutinizing the process. They are very interested in understanding the latest methods on
influencing voters’ decision making process considering the hijacked elections in other
African countries like Kenya and Nigeria. Some see Cambridge Analytica’s meddling as a
new form of corporate colonialism, others raise the urgent question if this is even the end of
democracy?
So your project comes out of a critique of the world of global capital and ‘big data and is
applied to the specific Senegalese context’?
Yes – ALGO-RHYTHM, which is part of a larger work, asks broad questions about the
human impact of ‘smart’ tech: who owns the future? who predicts best? who knows us ‘better
than we know ourselves’? and how can we reclaim our psychological and emotional
autonomy? But though the target audience is global, the characters, language, and locations
will resonate particularly strongly in Senegal.
How did you meet the rappers?
I am currently on a Human Rights Fellowship with the Open Society Foundation, during
which I’m exploring ethical issues raised by algorithmic decision making. The Foundation
brought the Fellows to a meeting in Dakar for four days.
That’s not long!
No, and I dislike going on long distance trips for such short periods. I planned to extend my
stay and conduct some aspects of my research there, to avoid a Euro or US-centric narrative.
A Senegalese filmmaker in London introduced me to Xuman, an incredibly original and well-
respected voice in the hip hop scene of Dakar, and he very generously helped to put the cast
together.
So I ended up in Dakar over Easter with my two children who were on holiday from school,
my partner and collaborator Mukul, and other team members from Berlin.
That’s quite a cool Easter holiday, did your kids enjoy it?
It was actually a really exhilarating adventure, from the start. We were staying on an idyllic
island, three minutes by boat from mainland Dakar. But when we arrived, we couldn’t find a
pier – we had to roll up our trousers and walk through the crashing waves, holding our
children and hauling cameras, laptops and synthesizers above our heads, to clamber into a
small wooden boat. And all of this with only the moon for light. Everyone was excited. My
older son is 12 and is always making things. He ended up doing 3D photogrammetry scans of
all the rappers for us!
That sounds extraordinary. I would have loved to have learnt about filmmaking when I was a
kid.
Location scouting can be seen as an alternative form of sightseeing, I guess! {Laughter] I like
my kids being involved even if it means sacrificing a tight production schedule. I like to
pursue a way of life that’s inclusive, encourages their curiosity and opens up formal learning
to experiences outside the box. Life-long learning and questioning.
Also, you seem to target younger audiences with this piece of work...
Absolutely. I asked myself - can I craft an audio-visual language that extends this urgent
debate about online disinformation, fake news, voter micro-targeting to young people? I have
a lot of hope and trust in generation Z, who grew up with a complete digital footprint, to
inspire and demand reform.
On location, Dakar 2018
CREW
DIRECTOR
PRODUCER
EDITING
PHOTOGRAMMETRY
Manu Luksch
SOUND
Mukul
Lyrics based on a text by Manu Luksch & Mukul Patel, co-written with Gunman
Xuman and Keyti Cheikh Séne
WITH
Gunman Xuman, OMG, Lady Zee, Adja Fall, Illégal, Kruh Mandiou Mauri, MC Mo,
Rhapsod and Madzoo
IMMERSIVE FX CONSULTANT & KINECT OP
Jack Wolf
CAMERA OP
DRONISTA
Malick Sy
ANIMATION
Georgi Stamenov
CODING
Federico Foderaro, Mukul Patel
PRODUCTION MANAGER (Senegal)
Baila Sy
SUPPORTED BY
Open Society Foundations, denkbar projektentwicklungs gmbh, Wien
DISTRIBUTION
SALES
sixpackfilm
TECHNICAL DATA
AT/GB 2019, DCP (24fps, SMPTE, CINEMASCOPE), Sound 5.1, color, 14 min
BIOGRAPHIES
MANU LUKSCH
Over the past 20 years, Manu Luksch has been researching the effects of emerging
technologies on daily life, social relations, urban space, and political structures. Currently, as
Resident Artist at Somerset House London, Open Society Fellow, she is investigating the rise
of the 'Algorithmic City', with a focus on corporate-governmental relationships and the social
effects of predictive analytics. Her films and art works are included, amongst other, in the
Collection de Centre Pompidou, the BFI National Archive, and the Core Collection at the
Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, and were awarded Best Feature Documentary,
Moscow International Documentary Film Festival 2016; Best Film, Austrian Film Critics
Awards 2017; Best Feature Documentary Soundtrack, [Link] Munich 2016; ELEVATE
Artivism Award 2015; [Link] Prize for Digital Art 2012, City of Linz /Ars
Electronica Centre.
Films (Selection)
Dreams Rewired (2015, feature, co-directed with Martin Reinhart & Thomas Tode)
Third Quarterly Report (2016; double projection)
Unknown Territories (2014)
Sympathetic Nervous System (2009)
Faceless (2007)
Broadbandit Highway (2001)
Virtual Borders (2001, feature)
So Oder Anders (1996)
GUNMAN XUMAN
Makhtar Fall aka Gunman Xuman is a Senegalese Hip Hop Pioneer, social justice activist,
and TV Co-Host of the popular Journal Rappe that innovatively raps the news and educate
audiences on the social, environmental, political and other issues that affects Senegal, Africa
and the world.
He started in the 90s as a leader of the group Pee Froiss along with Daddy Bibson, Sister
Joyce, Sun Souley, Aladjiman, Kool Koc-Sis and Dj Gee Bayss. Born in Ivory Coast but
raised in Senegal, Xuman started rhyming in the popular Dakar neighborhood of Fass in at an
early age.
Xuman is one of the major actors of Senegalese hip-hop and has performed on the biggest
stages like the Würzburg Festival, the Summer jam in Germany, Pireneos in Spain, Festival
Boulevard of Casablanca, Ouaga Hip-Hop in Burkina Faso, Gabao Hip-Hop in Gabon, La
Friche in Marseille, and festivals in Congo, Algeria, and more.
Since April 2013, Xuman and good friend Keyti launched Journal Rappe that has garnered
both national and international praise. Through actively engaging youths and adults in music,
Hip Hop, education and innovative approach to rap the news “Journal Rappe” has been
highly effective in bringing attention to wide range of issues ranging from social,
environmental, political, cultural, and more in Senegal and other countries. As a result of his
work, Journal Rappe as an innovative concept to deliver the news and a platform for freedom
of expression among youths is now taking roots in countries like Cote D’Ivoire, Mali,
Madagascar, and as far as Jamaica in the Caribbean.
Discography Pee Froiss
Wala Wala Bok (1996)
Affaire Bou Graw (1997)
Ah Simm (1999)
F.R.O.I.S.S (2001)
Konkérants (2003)
OMG
Senegalese musician Oumy Gueye performs under the stage name OMG, singing and rapping
across Afrobeat and World Music. Her first single HEY GIRL (2013) was followed by the 5-
track EP FEEM (‘Engaged and Entrepreneurial Women in Music’, 2016), a duet with Mamy
Victory. Also in 2016, OMG participated in FIMU (International Festival of University
Music) in Belfort, France. FEEM was followed by the 7-track EP Zik de FAM (‘Music from
Modern African Woman’). OMG was one of 10 finalists of the Prix RFI Découverte in 2017
and 2018. She won ‘Best Female Artist’ at the Galsen Hip Hop Awards and ‘Best Female
Singer’ at the Raya Music Awards 2018. Her most recent EP, Melokaan, was released in July
2019. Hits include: Lu Ci Sa Yoon, Waxoma Woon Lii, Boum Bam, Koti Koti and Lady
Boss.
film still. ALGO-RHYTHM
LADY ZEE
Senegalese artist Lady Zee, aka Princesse Sérère Page, has been driven by a passion for soul,
R&B, rap, and gospel music since childhood. A student of the Voice Music School and
Language Centre, Dakar, she studied piano and song with Congolese artist Herman Mocc.
Alongside a solo career launched with her first single Fresh in the Game (2011), she has been
part of the women's hip hop collective GOTAL, whose Jafte (2018) was nominated for best
EP at the Galsen Hip Hop Awards.
Lady Zee assisted Saintrick Mayitoukou in realising the 6th Cours Sainte Marie of Hann
festival of music (2013) and participated in Fatou Kandé Senghor’s mixed media project I Be
Lady O alongside artists from Morocco, France, Cameroon and England (2018). She has
collaborated with Xuman on the JT Rappé video segment ‘Silence on coupe’ and with
Matador on his album Reewga@l Nation.
She balances her music-making with a diverse work life that includes directing
communication for Genji Hip Hop, an association of women involved with urban cultures.
MUKUL PATEL
Mukul Patel plays predominantly with sound, text, and processes. As composer and sound
artist, he has collaborated with artist filmmakers and many leading contemporary
choreographers. As writer, his work ranges across territories and genres – a recent book on
mathematics for children was shortlisted for the 2014 Royal Society Prize, and the script of
DREAMS REWIRED is his second to be voiced by Tilda Swinton. His practice displays
both analytic and synthetic approaches. When existing standards fail to accommodate a
vision, he develops open, efficient solutions (for example, live immersive audio-visual
environments, and stereoscopic film viewers). Mukul has run tactical media labs in arts
faculties and taught space to architecture students. Major influences include the music of
North India, 1960s–70s conceptual practice, and the OuLiPo.
Selected works:
TWELVETWENTYONE (music for Le Ballet National de l’Opéra de Lyon,
chor. Russell Maliphant, 2019/2004)
DUBAI CREEK TOWER, audio infrastructure (for Billings Jackson Industrial Design,
London). 2017/18
SPIRAL PASS (music for Bayerisches Staatsballett, Munich chor. Russell
Maliphant, 2014)
STILL/CURRENT (music for Russell Maliphant Company / Sadler’s Wells, London
and vinyl EP, 2014)
WE’VE GOT YOUR NUMBER (mathematics book for children: 96pp, Kingfisher:
2013, *shortlisted: Royal Society Prize 2014)
TEN THOUSAND WAVES (music for 9-screen installation by Isaac Julien, 2010)
LOVE, PIRACY & THE OFFICE OF RELIGIOUS WEBLOG EXPANSION (participatory
installation: text, procedural censorship, collective reading, 2009–, with Manu Luksch)
FACELESS (soundtrack and script for speculative fiction film by Manu
Luksch, 2007)
CONTACT
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Tel: +43 1 526 09 90 0
Fax: +43 1 526 09 92
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Contact UK
Manu Luksch
manu@[Link]
[Link]
