Experiments at the Intersection of Art, Law and Innovation
You. You. My. Name is Judy dinner and as the Richard Benson assistant, curator of photography, and digital media it is my pleasure to introduce Hayden, visiting artist Bradley Samuels. Samuels. Is a founding, partner of c2 a research, design and fabrication firm founded, in 2005, in Brooklyn while, its four partners were studying architecture, at the Cooper Union, CJ's. Research division, is focused, on innovating, new visual, and spatial tools, to. Address social scientific. And artistic challenges. That are grounded in urgent, contemporary. Issues across, the diverse array of fields, tonight. Samuels, will present form inadmissibility. Experiments. At the intersection, of art law and innovation, a talk, that will take us through some of CJ's collaborative, work with, human rights organizations, and legal teams and the. Ways in which they employ spatial systems to map analyze, and make visible crucial. Evidence. For. The exhibition before, the event after the fact contemporary, perspectives, on war currently. On view on the fourth floor of the gallery c2. Has contributed a project that investigates, the, Maidan protests, that took place in Kiev Ukraine from. November 2013, to. February 2014. Tonight. He will discuss this project along, with other recent casework with, an emphasis on the multi-faceted, approaches. His firm takes towards human rights, in. Addition. To this important. Work Samos, has taught geospatial. And information, based mapping at Columbia Columbia University's. Graduate School of Architecture. Planning. And preservation I, invite. You all to view the exhibition after the talk we're open till 8 o'clock tonight and I hope that you will also join us afterwards for, reception in the lobby please. Join me now in welcoming Bradley. Samuels. Great, thank, you Judy, it's, really an honor to be a, part of the exhibition and have a chance to share, some of this work with you all. I've. Titled the talk formatted, miscibility experiments. At the intersection, of art law and innovation. Because. I think. We're. Kind of interlopers, in this context. You know that this work is not really made for an art context, but. Because it's not made for an art context, it sort of hinges. On questions of innovation and what role you. Know sort of visual. Material can play in in, courts, and in advocacy around human rights. I'm. Gonna break. The talk down to a series of themes so, the, question of expertise, which I'll get into first casework, will be most of it taking. You through a project at the International, Criminal Court and then. The. Madan protests, the work we're doing for a national, court in Ukraine. Representation. And then, then ending. Up on on facts, because that's always the first question I get when I finish talking. And. The. Kind of speculative. Project. Is really, about this you know. This. Is the normal. Kind of product. From fact-finding. Work. That happens in human rights contexts whether it's advocacy or legal it tends to be long-form, textual, written. Information and just historically, and even, even today and, the. Idea, here is you know Ken. Artists, can architects, can filmmakers. Produce. Other forms of fact-finding and reporting also analysis, that. Supplements. Compliments for places in some cases what, would otherwise be tests and so in this case I'm showing you a report that the UN Special Rapporteur on, counterterrorism. Did, on civilian, casualties from drone strikes that, was full of descriptions of, spatial. Phenomena, videos. Photographs. All. Kinds of datasets that somehow, had to be kind of described. Instead of shown so. Can. We move into something like this when it's appropriate when there is space at work when there is representational, questions at work and when you're dealing with new, types, of media and, say this I'm just giving you a kind of emblematic example this. Is a project we did for an attorney Michael's far to human rights attorney who. Is representing, the, families of a the family of a protester who was killed in the, West Bank when he was struck in the chest with a tear, gas canister during, a, protest. The. Question was basically did, the IDF fire in breach of open fire regulations and, he. Had at his disposal a number of videos citizen, videos that, all captured the moment of death none, of which captured, both the the person, shooting and, the, victim at the same time so it came down to, can.
An Architect, come. In and help with. The kind of sophisticated, spatial. Reconstruction, to begin to answer the question of that. Needed to be addressed for accountability, in this case it was a. Military. Tribunal, not a, civil. Context, but. It was about drawing is about descriptive. Geometry and, is about making. A case visually. And. I, also just want to say this is the piece that's upstairs. It's. Important, for me to kind of articulate, that this piece is derivative, the, sequence, of our work is. Always in the service of the, lawyers and the activists, we're working for it doesn't it's not made for art contexts, it's, not made within our context in mind it, sometimes ends up in our contexts, and I sometimes, end. Up in discourse or speaking in context, like this but. It's. Made for court or it's made as a kind of advocacy campaign and so when, Judy contacted, me I think back in early 2017, to, ask what we were working on I mentioned, we were working on the project. Of an event reconstruction, of the euro Madan protests, and that, the trial is happening in June we were finishing in June. The. Trial got delayed and of course the exhibition opened up in July so I was a. Little, uneasy actually, to be frank about this work. Being. Shown publicly first, in a museum before did, its work in court and so, we ended up producing as a kind of redacted version, of the, analysis, which, will then replace with. Unredacted. Material. When. The trial. Happens in November so if, you go back in November at some point you should see it swapped out with new, material. I, think. I'm gonna get into the question of expertise, this. Is really typical typical. Scene in our studio this is not you know a forensics. Lab this is a architecture. And, design studio, and it's. An intensely. Collaborative. Process. Everything we do is interdisciplinary, almost everything we do, we're. Almost always working with lawyers with, with experts. And activists, and, often with others as well so in this and this, scene for example you have. Ukrainian, attorney we're working with you've got the, historian. Who's the head of the Center for Human Rights science at Carnegie Mellon we've, got a computer scientist also at Carnegie Mellon who's working on some automation stuff I'll talk to you about in a minute there's, somebody trained in is a geographer, who's now a scriptura coder type, a.
Landscape. Architect a. Environmental. Engineer and a mechanical engineer who's also an activist so, this is. Fundamental. To how we work in the again, the premises that we're trying to do new things and, tap, into expertise, which is when put together the greater than the sum of its parts. It. Creates. Possibilities. But it also creates problems. And. I. Think the question of expertise, is I don't. Know a problem, is the way it really categorize. It but I. Wanted. Really an anecdote which I think brings into focus. This. Is dr. Eric, Picard. He's. The head of the scientific response, unit at the International, Criminal Court and the hague and. When. We begin, our work it's. Almost always the same whether it's at Amnesty or Human Rights Watch or it's with attorneys. Or at the ICC it. Usually starts with us going and, presenting, what we've done in the past talking. About the tools that we use you know 3d modeling software parametric. Tools, coding. And development capabilities. And. It. Results, in a kind of conversation, about, what they're working on you, know whether it's advocacy project or it's a legal case and it. Becomes a generative you, know project, over a course of time so. I went to the I went to the Hague to do just that. It. Was a sort of exploratory visit, and I met with dr. Picard in his office and we, had a really interesting conversation about, new. Technologies, of the ICC, and, then in the afternoon I presented to a larger audience and I presented to about 30 people so there were people from the office of the prosecutor which. Are the lawyers from. The Investigations, Division which, are detectives, and investigators, and. Then, folks from the scientific, response unit which is basically their forensics, division and dr., Picard is the when. I say he's an expert he's a forensic pathologist every. Credential, you could possibly imagine in terms of forensic, science and. He's really the gatekeeper, for, evidence at the ICC and I. Finished, presenting and. Immediately. A. Kind. Of very spirited, and robust. Conversation. Argument. Broke out amongst, the people, that were attending and it, basically broke down along these, lines the, office of the prosecutor, was. Clamoring. For. Things. Like this you, know new tools new, ways to present videos. Photographs. To. Visualize material, to make kind of more. Powerful. Arguments. For the casework they saw tremendous potential, and wanted, to begin using it immediately, dr.. Picard on the other hand was. Concerned. I, would say he, wasn't concerned about the the substance, of the work that, wasn't the point his. Concern was we. Do all this work we spend months we spend years, we. Submit a report to court and it gets the defense questions. The credentials, and everything gets thrown out who, are these people they're architects they're artists I mean, I don't mean he wasn't glib like that but it was that, was the point you know there, was no clarification, of this, type of interdisciplinary. Work and there was no. Structure. For it at the ICC let alone many other places and so it. Was a really interesting conversation, and. Ultimately. A productive, one and we ended up at a place where there was a line, drawn a line drawn between. Presentation. And, analysis. And we. We sort of collectively decided the office of the prosecutor investigations. And SRU the. Presentation, is something we could take on c2 could. Work on a case, that had presentation. As its mandate we. Could not veer into analysis because once we move into analysis. The. Whole question of credentials, becomes very acute and problematic, and so. I'm. Going to show you one case that's about presentation, for the ICC in one case which is about analysis in a court which didn't have the same there. Was no doctor but card, so. There were other opportunities and, challenges. Let's, say. So. The first one this, is the the first of two cases this is for the International, Criminal Court. This. Is a case, involving the destruction. Of cultural heritage in Timbuktu, Mali some. Of you may have seen it in the news it was, wrapping. Up about September about this time last year in, 2016. It. Was the first time the ICC, had tried, someone for the destruction of cultural heritage there, was precedent. At the ICTY, the trial for the former Yugoslavia but, not not, at the ICC and so it was the first in many ways. There's. A series of Muslims around Timbuktu, which, were destroyed, by.
A Group. Called on sardine which is al Qaeda affiliate, and. Over. A few. Months at the end of 2012 into 2013, very. Systematically, and very clearly and so their. Problem, set that they gave us was that they had a. Tremendous, amount of data. But. Needed to be organized and and, a tool needed to be created for them to be able to presented, in court in a coherent and compelling way and. This. Is the the gentleman. One. Of the members of on Sardinia sort of mid-level operative. Who was picked up by the. ICC. And. Who ultimately was on trial he's not the only person that was participating, in the destruction obviously but once. You start working with the ICC you understand the complexities, of jurisdiction, and and how, they can try things and so this was a sort of. Emblematic. In many ways for a much larger case and, also many other crimes that were committed they. Focused on the destruction of cultural heritage but there are many other things this. Person and others could have been tried for. So. What do we have in terms of evidence. We. Had photographs a lot of photographs photographs, of, before, destruction. During, destruction, and after. Destruction. There, were hundreds what, you see the ye, on the top right they're sort. Of alphanumeric that's. The evidence number so all this is kind of sitting. In the evidence unit at the ICC and given to us we're not collecting this information ourselves it's all been vetted and provided by the ICC but. There's hundreds of pieces of material some. Drawings as well. There's. Video people actually destroying. Shrines. And. The. Number of videos, there. Was geospatial. Information so it was before and after satellite imagery on the left the before, and, satellite. They were taking, the satellites, that, were passing us as soon as possible over after destruction and trying to get. As many of those as possible so you can really clearly see that extent to the damage and the difference. And.
Then There was the work that scientific, response unit did on the ground, afterwards. Documenting, so they would travel twice, to the Timbuktu. And take these these very very detailed panoramic. Images, and so, photos. Videos. Geospatial. And panoramic. Content, and lots, of it. So. What we had to do our mandate, keeping in mind this is about presentation, and that's a hard line. Was. To to build something that was. A, kind of tool that would, allow them to. Present. This material in court dynamically, so it, was not an idea that we would you know we wouldn't produce something that we would give to the judge or that they would give to the judge to, review like. A normal report this is a tool for court. For use in court and. So on the, upper left are, your photos and videos on, the, upper right your geospatial, information and, then, your panoramic, Kelantan the blob and I'll walk you through is really the beginning of this was that this was a design project before it became a kind of coding and development project, how, do we make the simplest possible tool. That. Has no linear sort. Of way of navigating through it and. This is just a quick demo it's, on our website, if you want to play with it as well it became public after the after, the trial was public but. You can see on the upper left moving, through. I think before imagery there and. This ability to kind of view things synthetically, in other words that. Sort of triptych, set up where you can see photographs you can see the map you can see the piano at the same time is useful it's. Also useful to be able to kind of look at one thing at a time so, this was. Designed with that with that in mind and. You know in our studio we designed it but we also did the coding and development and they, were providing, the assets, so to speak. And. I think at the very I didn't say at the very beginning but I think you saw a map of Timbuktu so you can navigate geospatially. Across the different sites or on the left you. Can navigate, to. The different sites as well and. This was produced in close dialogue with the attorneys. And. Of course an. Office of course but. If. We don't get a handle on what the. Specs are in the court in terms of Av and tech, and how. Things work. It'll. Be useless right so this. They were it was interesting they were just moving into a new building so this is the new ICC building and was the first case in that building and it was set up it. Was actually optimized for digital presentations, that was great we. Did have to make a locally, hosted platform. Which was. Interesting. Because all these assets were being served up online but. Originally. But. We had to kind of think about this space and what would work and. What wouldn't I just show you before. I show you. The. Arc of this trial was, interesting, the the sort. Of first. Moment. Of involvement, for us was before the confirmation, of charge versus charges confirmed in March 2016. This. Is a closed, session and so they presented all of the evidence that they had, and. Then. In the, intervening period between March, and September, 2016. He, pled guilty so. The. Final which you see verdict in sentencing, is basically a pro. Forma but basically he'd pled guilty at that point but. There was a public presentation, of the, evidence. And. Somewhat. Redacted because a lot of the assets that were shown in the closed hearing would have been. Would. Compromise some other witnesses and sources. Couldn't be shown publicly. I'm. Just gonna play I'm just going to show you how. How. It was used in court. Your. Honors. This. Presentation, which. You will be seeing in a few moments, is an interactive, platform that, allows, us to, provide. An, optimal. Presentation. Of the various videos that the prosecution, found on the internet regarding, the destruction. That occurred in, Timbuktu, in June and July 2012. Now. Here, you, can see that, there are two windows one, to the left which, includes, the, list, of the various, sites that were mentioned in of the charge then. You have the main window to the right with. A satellite. Image of Timbuktu and the. Various sites that were destroyed, have been located, on this, image thanks to their GPS, coordinates. When. It is ruler Tanya stone. On the 30th of June 2012. The operations. Finished, towards, midday and the unique afternoon. The, attackers. Went. Towards. The Alpha, Moyer. Cemetery. And if. I click on. The. Name the. Three. Sub, windows open. In. The. Main window, and. You will see in. The upper right window, the ruins of the, Alpha Moyer mausoleum. And. You will see that in. The satellite, picture. The 18th of June.
2012, Its intact whereas. On the 15th, of July 2012. Image. It has been destroyed. There. Are two panoramas. If. I click on the. One in the south. It's. On that side that most of the videos. Were taken, from. The side of the doll. I'm. Now going, to in. The upper, central, window. Actually, could I click. On the. Before, icon. I. Show. You a. Photograph. Of. The. Alpha man where mausoleum. With. A certain number of people from Timbuktu who have come together before, it that's obviously before it was destroyed and. I. Click. On, the Geron icon. It. Contains, numerous, videos, I won't. Show them all. But. I would remind, you first of all before going. Into, it what mr. Ahmadi did he admitted he was present he, gave orders, he. Also physically, participated. In, the destruction. So. It's. Not. It's. Not the most innovative. Project. We've ever been involved with or. Demanding. In some sense but, it. Was impactful. In this case. The. There was a preponderance, of evidence and. We. Understand from the ICC and we, don't I mean I certainly don't take any more credit than is due to us because, there's a lot of people that worked in this but. It was very helpful to them to, be able to make that argument in that way for, this particular case. And. A. Lot of our work is about impact and so I think this was a case where there was you. Know there was impact in. Terms of the sentencing, in terms of. Restitution. And other, things, it. Was built in a way that anticipates, other uses, so you. Know there's, jurisdictional. Obstacles. But whether, it's Paul Mira or it's Yemen. Or somewhere else you. Could imagine. Using. That tool for, other other, cases where the cultural. Heritage has been destroyed or whether even you need to sort of understand. Visual information synthetically. And we've used it a few times since. I'm. Going to move now into the the euro Madan case which. Is again, much more of a, analytical, project. It. Is a project that's very much about video. And about citizen, video and about the kind of capturing of information, by. Citizens. And. So this. I'll, show you this kind of montage in a minute but but, hundreds and hundreds of videos were what we were given to work with so a slightly. Different problem set, a. Very. Brief overview many. Of you are probably familiar with. The events, but this, is the. Euro madam protests, started in November, 2013 and. Culminated. On February, 20 of 2014, there. Were about a hundred people there were a hundred people killed over that period of time on February 20th, there were 47. Civilians. Killed, three. Police and. On. February 21st. Yanukovych, flees, into exile. In. Russia and, shortly. After the annexation of Crimea, begins so. There were. And we're kind of ultimately, focused on a very narrow literally. Seconds in. This conflict but there is a larger geopolitical context. To keep in mind. It. Is also really important, to remember that, because this protest was happening over months the, amount of coordination among protesters was, was. High. So. This is I'm just showing you this as, a kind of emblematic, video we like I said there's hundreds of them but lots. Of content taken by people on the ground. But. By civilians, by protesters, and. I think one thing to note here when I say that it happened over a long period of time it was coordinated, you start to see this kind of like, almost. Like Blade Runner or like scenario, battle, armor ad-hoc, barricades. And perimeters. That's. All partially a product of the fact that it was. Ultimately. Very coordinated, the. Other product of the coordination, is that is the sheer amount of. Documentation. That there was which, ultimately was very useful to us, so. Lots of video, of, civilian. Movements. Also. Lots of video. Captured. By civilians, capture. By Network footage. Works. There also, by CCTV. Cameras. Balancing, all. Of that it's what's. Important here for us is. You. Know we need to understand, ultimately this is about accountability and, court. And. The, death of civilians, we, need to understand, where, troops. Were and where specific, civilians were at, a certain moment in time so again. While not every you know you won't have a piece, of footage which captures all of it you'll. Have multiple pieces of footage which capture the same moment in time from different different, Vantage's and we need to put that together so. That's. Why understanding where these guys were and, when civilians were is, is, critical. These. Are locations, where, people suffered. Fatal injuries, civilians. This. Was given to us by the prosecutor's, office and I just want to it's. Really, largely about video but there's a lot of there's some supplementary, evidence, that was very helpful as, well and of course knowing where people were and when they were shot, was.
Paramount Night I'm, sorry I didn't say this earlier I, forget. To say this. It's. It's it's graphic. You're, gonna see, some graphic footage. We've. Been looking at this material for a long time and, I'm I. Forget. That when I show it to people that, it's, helpful to sort of give. You that warning a. Word. About the kind of the folks who are working on this because I think it is, not. Possible, without the team. That we have here like it literally would not have, been possible. So. We're. Functioning is the kind of situ is the kind of doing. The spatial analysis and a lot of the coding and development work we're, working for the attorneys, Pavel, Deakin and Alexandra, yet Senko who are again, representing, families of civilians, of that were killed and based. And it's really they're. They're. Framing the legal argument and the work is in the service of what they're presenting in court. The. Center for Human Rights science, is a really interesting group, at Carnegie Mellon headed up headed up by a guy named Jay Aronson, a, nominally. Historian, or maybe, he has a degree in a science technology and society but really, is a kind of curator. Of collaborations. And. Guy. Who pulls like interdisciplinary. Folks, together and and he, actually was, at his conference that we met Alexandra, and Pavel and they just showed up from Kiev, with a hard drive and a problem and so, that was the genesis of all this was Jay there's. Computer science folks working on this Alex helped men who were doing some of the automation stuff I'll show you, and. Then, on the far left italianness, group is a woman in Evelina, and Nefertari who's, an activist. Was. On the ground during the Maidan protests, and also a, graduate, student in mechanical engineering, and. It was a really interesting collaboration. Because sometimes when we're working with on human. Rights violations, and often. Very remote parts of the world we. Don't always have a kind, of, sophisticated. Workflow between what happens in Brooklyn New York and what happens in, South Sudan on the ground but. In. This case. She. Actually, got. Us all kinds of data we wouldn't we, wouldn't we, weren't used to getting so it was it was a really interesting way to work with someone. On the ground. This, is typical of kind, of work sessions this is Pavel and Alexandra, we're, working by Skype or sending things back and forth. They're, fantastic. That you know they came to New York once in the middle but most of the time it's weekly Skype sessions and a lot of verification, you know a lot of this, is what we think we understand from the data can you go out and measure again can. You can you confirm that this video is in fact vetted a lot. Of back and forth and I I wanted to say briefly. What the legal framework is here because it's super important the argument that's being made is. A. Terrorism. Argument, so. It's. Not they're not looking to establish. Which Bitterroot. Officer. Which is the Special. Forces the unit of Special Forces that, were firing on civilians which. Which brute officer killed, which civilian, they're. Making a terrorism argument, so that which is about establishing. That. There was a coordinated.
Effort. To to, intimidate, and ultimately fire on unarmed, billions and so that changes our problem set it. Goes from being kind of where was one individual, and the other individual, to where. Was the individual of a shot and where. Were the where, was the group or the unit firing, from and, that's a much more. Manageable threshold. In terms of our analysis, it would have been impossible for us you'll, see the bit cruder all dressed in black they're wearing yellow armbands they all have balaclavas. On impossible. To tell them apart there's one guy that has missing, a hand and, you can distinguish, him but everyone else is, it's. Very very hard so, the. Legal framework drives everything and I think I just. Wanted to mention that and. Tomorrow. I'll. Be doing. A seminar here in pawel will be joining and, I think if, any of you can join please. Do because I think hearing it in his words. Will. Be great this. Is. This. Is Evelina's, work the. Mentioning. She. Painstakingly. Synched, with hundreds. Of videos. To. Begin to kind of start the analysis process and then upper-left what you see is a global call which is nine twenty, five in the morning and. All, these videos were taken at 9:25. When you see something go gray it's because there's only eight, videos instead of nine in, some, cases there's more than nine but it. Was sort of conceit was your brain can handle so much at one time. Nines, about as. Much as we can look at but there's sometimes ten or eleven or etc. But. She did it just on audio audio, sinking and she did it took her money took her like eight months to do this to do this work and. Is incredibly. Helpful. Incredibly. Helpful starting point for us. But. It also had certain challenges, so for example we begin our work we know someone has killed at 9:26. For example we. Want to know how, to get the video in the upper right she. Didn't keep a record of that there wasn't a spreadsheet there. Was only her. Final. Cut file, which, had all this morass. Of the, videos, and. So. This. Is what we were given you know we had a Bellino's poeple we all have this very messy, data. Set to work with it prohibitively. Messy in, other words how do we begin to work through hundreds and hundreds of thousands, of hours of video. Just. Combing through by, eye and so. That's where J and the folks at Carnegie Mellon come in and the question of automation enters. I'll. Come back to that in a second, in. Terms of other assets the there were surveys of the site so there was a we. Were given a topographic. Map of the site on the right you can see the locations, of people. Who were where. They received fatal wounds this is from the prosecutor's, office it's. About two meter resolution. There. Were pathology, reports which, document. Very extensively, the wounds that were suffered and. In this case for us the entry and exit wounds became very important, this. Was another. Piece. Of evidence that was critical. And then. Our work began sort of modeling the space and so we're. Beginning to position, videographers. Where, videos were taken where, people were killed in. Three dimensions and that's the sort of at the beginning of the project as we're doing that, Evelina. Comes.
Is. Able to deliver a second data set which is a laser, scan of. Most. Of downtown Kiev which if, any of you have ever worked the laser scan is incredible, I mean it took her again weeks to do this huge. Amount of data but basically sub sub centimeter resolution for. All of the metropolitan, area and this. Is opens, up all kinds of possibilities that the two meter resolution data, set didn't. And. Very uncommon to get this much the city I mean we'll see it more and more I think Google is kind of all over this now and a couple years we'll have laser. Scans of this resolution of lots of cities but we doesn't, exist yet and, so. For us part of the problem was. That. Was a huge. Amount. Of data very difficult to work with in terms of processing, power how. Do we begin to come up with strategies where we can nest high. Resolution information. Into. Sort of contextual. Information which, is manageable, from a processing standpoint, so there's, a two dimensional drawing here in black and white and then, nested, inside that is that is the area where really we really need to understand it at a high resolution. And, then also doing, that in 3d and I just wanna draw your attention to there's. A massing model which is the white there's, the point cloud which is the color and then, there's that kind of cottage cheese looking, stuff throughout. That's. Those, these kind of temporary perimeters, and why it's important to mention, those is because those, are ephemera those are not there when when. When the laser scan is being done months. Later those are sort of tires, and debris and, detritus. That were junk. But junk that was critical, to establishing, perimeters, and understanding troop movements so. Building. Those back into the digital, model from what's observable in the video footage was super important in a kind of added layer of information. And. Just. To get back to the automation so this is Carnegie Mellon's work and. Basically what Carnegie Mellon focused, on most was two things they wanted to see if they could kind.
Of Reproduce. Evelina's. Work, in, other words establish. A global clock for the video but, to do it in an automated fashion so. What they're doing here is they're. Taking. Audio. Signatures, distinct, audio signatures, they built a tool to, once. You have one ground truth - audio in other words you establish definitively, what time the, video was shot and you have audio features. In it you can then comb through other videos and find those same features and sync, them up in an automated fashion. So, that's what this this, process is about and it's. Not perfect but. What it does is it gets us. From. Instead. Of having to go through hundreds and hundreds of videos we can go through 40, or 50 it becomes manageable and so, it's a really interesting kind of threshold between, automation. And human intelligence which i think is really relevant to many. Things right now automation. Gets you to a certain point it, does not get us all the way. And in. Addition so this this produced, the kind of global, clock. Information. In addition to that which we'll see in a moment is geolocation. And. That. Is basically trying to determine where the videos were taken so what they're doing here is and. Jay can explain, the more this tomorrow is. They're combing through Flickr. And Street, View and they're. Ripping keyframes from, the, might on videos and they're. Finding they're using algorithms to find matches for features. Distinct, features in the landscape and so when the algorithm. Finds a match it'll say you know we think this is the same obelisk, or building, or whatever and then it'll give you four or five matches you you'll then a. Human, will sit down and look at it determine, that three of them are correct two of them are incorrect it'll train itself and and. Redo, it again and there's a point of diminishing returns but again it, gets, us to a point where the data is manageable and. It's. Interesting for lots of reasons but for us what was critical, was that it gave us this and this. Is basically a spreadsheet which takes every, video and, all, these different file conventions. For different people different. Hardware lists. Them and then gives us the global clock and the, Geo and the location, Latin lawn of each and so, when we begin to try and the, lawyers are asking us questions about this death. Or that death this. Tells us which videos it's a starting point for understand which videos are relevant. And I'm, going to show you the platform in a moment that. We built and I should I should say I think I mentioned it's the beginning you know this is about. To go to trial. And. The, problem the, problem set here. In. Some ways is this how do we how, do we go from this, sort. Of large. Complex. Urban. Environment, an event that happens over an extended period of time. All. The way down to this in a, coherent way it's. It's not easy and it, in fact the complexity, of it I think is a lot of. Challenge. Of that. The prosecution, is up against in other words it's, just too complex how can we possibly know anything, so our mandate, is really to sort of figure out what we can know and address and doing it build it in a way that is, clear. So. From the scale the city of the scale of the human body. I'm. Just going to open this platform. So. This. Part. Of this is on view upstairs and this. Is basically I showed you the ICC tool this. Is the tool that the lawyers are going to use at the the national court in Kiev.
And. They. Pawan Alexandra their initial brief is really about the cases section which I'll talk about but we since, we were working on this and because we're mandate is partially sort of methodological innovation. We, built out also. An overview section and an archive section I'm just going to take you through them. So. That the overview section is really about a, kind. Of linear. Curated. Narrative, of key events and sort, of makes make it sort, of complex, event digestible, without, making. It oversimplified, and so. You've, got animations, on the left to kind of establish where, you are you've, got videos on the right that help. You understand that, information and. You. Can then move through the. Content, at. Your own at your own pace. And. Again it's meant to be linear, you. Know people are people are kind of acquiring. This in lots of different ways. But. For example, those. Are the deaths here, sort of key features in the landscape that we want to bring your attention to for various reasons. The. Last, one here you'll see. The. Bank of Ukraine there's a CCTV, camera mounted on that building which captured, most. Of the troop movements at the moment the three of the individuals were killed so that's, why for example we're. Calling it out here. Police. And protesters positions. So. There's. Some times when we need to be incredibly specific and if we cannot be specific, it's, pointless or it's useless there, are other times we're actually a. General. Sense of where people were is helpful. Even, if we cannot be more specific than that so you see representationally, we're dealing with this differently did you kind of diffuse areas. They're. Based on videos. Like this you. Know, where you can see civilians, at different moments in time if. You can see my mouse yeah, over here this this area is. Is. Right, here. So. We know generally you know the time where. Protesters. Were and where military, were in the moments before a lot of the shooting happened. You, should advance. I just. Let this do it more time it's. It's. Meant for Court so it's not really optimized, for public, yet so it's. Gonna get a little smoother eventually. Right. So, clashes. You know these are key moments where we see military. And police interfacing. In, the videos and again there. Are large areas if we can be more specific the circle is smaller if we can't it. Says its it sort of corresponds, to what's observable. And Noble in the video in the video but the timeline is the important part or. The what's what has value here. Those. Yeah. So. At. A certain point the, military would, treat behind that barricade that I showed you that what I was referring to his cottage cheese which, is a debris. And. Shortly. After that a number of civilians are shot. And. I think it's going to show you where, that those. Shootings happened. Right, so the the protesters then sort, of advance. Everything. Seems to be frozen here for a second sorry. Just, close this out and try it again. Okay. Not. Gonna try my luck there with the overview section but I think that the general points is. Hopefully. Demonstrated, that we're moving through the space trying, to take things that are observable in the videos and make a kind of. Coherent. Narrative at it out of it the cases section is, really what the lawyers were asking us to focus on and, so. For. Reasons that we that, are often. Very absurd, but. Not probably, absurd to lawyers we. Often get asked to look at small. Very small parts of big cases so I said 47 people or 47, civilians, were killed that day we're, just being asked to look at three and the reason is that there's really good video. Footage of those three deaths. And. So. Here, you. Can. Basically. Look at each of the. The. Three and what, you have here is a kind of portal which gives you. The. Pathology. Report a, ballistics. Analysis. Which. Is somebody, we collaborated, with do an audio latency analysis, which I'll talk about in a minute the.
Videos Which. Correspond. To the time of death that are important and. Then ultimately an animation and I'll I'll. Show you that's when I bring your attention to what's going on here on the Left there's, a shot sector, which, is this cone basically. And. Then there's an overlap overlapping. Sort of set of radius. Radii, which are the. Audio latency analysis. And. I'll take you through that in a minute. So, this is where the digital model becomes, very useful becomes, critical not just the digital model but the laser scan. We. Need to be sort of as high resolution as we can here but we cannot create. Animations like this entirely in a point, cloud environment, it's just again. Too too taxing on processing power so that's why we're moving between a, massing. Model here which is simpler and, the, point, cloud and you so we're establishing kind of key features in the landscape where. Videos were located. And. Then. This. This. Happens so we moved to the point cloud and we. Aligned it with. Video. Footage. So. You you basically contextualize, what, is. Observable in the video footage you begin to understand it in space and here it's about looking. At troop movements. In. The moments leading up to the death of that specific, individual. And. It goes on for some time here I don't need to show you all of this but you know being very clear about which other bear cruets know there are many military units. Moving. In that day. And. Then here, and. Again this is gonna be graphic I'm not gonna warn you, the. Civilian, who's, moving into the position where he's standing ultimately, when you get shot. And. Different, so now at a different camera this is a different angle different, videographer. Has. Just been shot. And. We're. Doing to two things one. Is an audio latency well we're not doing the audience analysis, Michael Knox the forensics. Expert. Is doing that. But. I'll talk you through it basically. When. You have audio. Of a gunshot if the video with, if the recording device is is is. Captures. The sound of the munition you tend you hear if you slow it way down you hear a tap tap and basically. The first one is the sound of the munition, breaking the sound, barrier or shock wave and the second is the actual discharge of the Venus and so. What Michaels doing is. Producing. A calculation based on the distance between, those two things and it will be able to say something about the distance of ultimately, the the, firearm. From. That. Not fit not that not the civilian but the the video camera. Right. And it. Provides a minimum and maximum distance, it's, a large area but, keep in mind this is the terrorism argument right this is not about where an individual, standing this is about generally. Where per could can be seen, in. The videos, and. So. The other part of what we've done is. Involving. The, pathology, reports which have to do with the entry and exit wounds from the body. And. This. Is trying to establish the general area. From which the shot could have been fired to produce these types of these wounds, and. So we're walking through this very systematically, the text you see here is the text that appears in the pathology report and. We worked on this also with another forensics, expert. Who. It was a sort of peer review did kind of peer review of all this work, and. So. What, you end up with is a vector which you, know we cannot be that precise but we can we, can be present for a nice precise enough to say you know this is a five degree cone either way and. So that gives you a kind. Of cone of fire and it's. Really the cone of fire overlapped, with the audio latency that becomes. The crux of the legal. Argument. And. Then. You know there's other parts of the video for example this is a third video which you see at the same moment in time from downhill. Where. You can establish. Charge. Of ammunition behind. That barricade which looks very compressed, in fact it's it's, about 120, meters away. But. We're trying to annotate. As, much as possible I'll, just skip towards the end here. And. So this. This. Last one is the CCTV, footage which I mentioned, that was on the bank, building so, this is critical you can see the recruit firing, from this position right here and none, of this is perfect in fact this footage we don't have the exact moment. In time that, the this. Individual was shot we, have a minute before and a minute or two afterwards, so, they're gonna you know it's the best case we can make with, the with, the material we have but you screwed your stationed there throughout both. Periods of time before and after immediately, before and after this.
Guy Was shot. And. Then the last part of the animation is. Really putting it together. This. Would be the cone of fire in the audio. So. There's a lot that goes into it but really ultimately this is kind of the only thing that matters. That's. The area we're saying that the shot could have been fired from and, it's interesting the people, we work with the forensics, expert, the folks who have. A lot of experience but they. They. Haven't yet, ever seen anything combined, in this way before which is was. Interesting for them and, for us. And. I, the. Last thing we'll show you very quickly here in this platform. Is the archive so we, have all that data. Why. Not make it you know searchable, so, to. Get out of the problem, with Evelina's content, where you couldn't understand, where which, video came from, basically. To a map on the geospatial, environment. On the left. Timeline. On the bottom here. Deaths. In. Vertical. Red lines and. Then basically, you know videos the. Length of the line corresponds, to the length of the video and you. You. Can kind of find the video you want this, way I mean you. Know now this is built we can use it for lots of other things we just need a spreadsheet and so this is not really useful to the lawyers necessarily. Although it might be it's more might. Be more useful to people doing investigative work. I. Just. Get back here. Okay. So. This is the again you know that that, step at the ICC where we really need to understand what the courtroom is and what the capabilities, are there's. No precedent for any submission, of online content, in the court so, again all this has to be locally hosted it's an interesting technical challenge because there's, terabytes. Of video and. A platform so. It's not just about a harddrive we had to actually we're sending over a small, nook the next, union of computing this Intel small. Computer basically which, is going to be tendered as evidence along, with a traditionally. Formatted, written, report. The. Courtroom itself on, the left is the drawing that Pavel made for us when he was visiting our studios but it exactly, shows you what's happening on the right. This. Is where the, content. Is going to be displayed on the screen. Judges. This. Is where the the defendants, so that are, sitting. It's actually was. A cage at some point announced this kind of glass container. Defense. And prosecution. This. Is the the hardware that we're sending over and. Has to be. There's. A bunch of sort of data verification steps, that we need to do to sort of authenticate. The chain of custody which is new territory for us as well I just. Want to close with a few kind of thoughts. Provocations. You. Know presenting. This work and in our context, was interesting for me I was an art history major, undergrad. And then got a second after grad in architecture. But. Thinking. About why why, I'm doing this work what. About my, education, and experiences. Have prepared, me to do it and. Somehow. Continually. Came back to Duchamp and. The. Three standard stoppages, as, kind of early work which. Was. Very much about sort of standards and measures questions, of you, know metrics, and questioning, of truth. For. Those of you who aren't familiar this is a piece. In which he dropped a piece of string from the three pieces of string from the same height and then kind of memorialized, the the shape, that. They took when they fell on the ground and. Then displayed. Them in a way that was consistent with the bureau of standards and measures displays. The, official meter right. It, was an interesting project it was very much the sort of that the origins. Of conceptual, art. This. In your collection I want to see it before I go is it on display, okay. But. Important, because it became the basis of. Not. Just sort of its own. Experiment. But but a narrative right that the coffee grinder was another project which was experimenting, with this, idea of a break from the retinal what he called the retinal a break from traditional nutritional modes of painting and representation. And. The. Painterly and I think the.
Conceit Here is that this is drafted, this is almost like an architectural representation, on the left. It. Doesn't. Have the retinal it's. Conceptual, in some sense and it but on the right it's mobilized, as part of a really. Complex. And compelling narrative which, I would say is not totally. Unrelated. To a legal, narrative. And so what I'm trying to do here is make, a linkage between, questions. Of standards questions of representation questions. Of narrative and say, that in fact that the legal context, and the museum. Context the art context, and specifically, conceptual, art are not that different in some ways I also think that the. Conceit that this is not a compelling, that this is not retinal, in, with. The hindsight of history, is crazy. To me it's, a beautiful incredibly. Well. Wrought image. In it it's. Seductive, and we're. Very aware that our work is seductive, and that, that's a force that's at play in court all the time. You. Look at Hans jaquez work this idea of the archive. Mobilizing. Forms of representation that borrow, from other, ways. Of representing truth or facts. Again. Becomes. A kind of form of activism and I think very much related to an. Inspirational, to the in, some ways not in a sort of direct, sense but to what we're doing you. Know when we're producing drawings like this this is for an entirely different project, but it it's. Not that different in some ways. And, I'm just going to close with. This. Idea of facts, you know the the the. Defense. As. We worked in this case the defense forwarded, an, assertion that. Yes. You can see all these brick hoots firing, at civilians, it's, very very clear in the video footage that. Of, course is not what. Matters in a case for of you, know wrongful death you need to know which you know did, in fact this, person get killed by this unit. The. Defense was saying how do we know that the. Shot wasn't fired from a rooftop there wasn't the sniper or somewhere how. Do we know it was those guys even though we can see them firing it may have been a shot that came from somewhere else and there. Were a lot of competing, narratives that were going on you know there. Were, the Russians operatives. Stationed snipers, stationed on rooftops were. There proto-fascist, factions. On the ground just so in chaos and also firing were, the 3rd and 4th parties acting at this event and you. Know it was a lot of competing noise and. Interestingly. When, we first started it seemed like sort of Alex Jones level, conspiracy, stuff but. Eventually. There's a consensus, there was a third party acting, its various forensic evidence that people were shot in the back somebody.
Was Shooting from rooftops. But. We had to you know our job is in some. Sense not, to if. There's no epiphany there's no sort of, synthesis. Of all this information a moment that what everything clinic clicks together it's it's way more banal, than that it's. About, not. Allowing these narratives, to. Become. The reason that. There's no accountability so, it's about taking the IPPS the, kind of wild, claims which are perfectly. Valid in a court context if you can't refute, them, and. Taking. Them out of the equation so that you can focus on what you do now and. I just I think that that's a, it's. That play in all kinds of ways more than it ever has been in. Sort of a contemporary political context. This. Is just a photograph from the pizza gate. Scenario. Where someone, had been listening to the kind of conspiracies, that were. Being played out and then took it upon himself to go to that, pizza. Shop and. Start shooting. And, so very very different context, but I think in, sort of falling into this. Question of competing narratives truth claims and facts and that's really what we're this work is about, I'll. Leave it there I'm happy to take any questions. How. You been presenting, it I mean, is there a time when you spend are you gonna be spending time with them before they make. The presentation. In the actual courtroom how does that get ya, together, the, way you know we bring different objects, together finally we install, I'm going to show. How. Does that work well, I think what would we expect to see is something like the ICC, scenario, it was built in a way that it. Could be queried it could be used in, a fluid way so, it's not scripted in that sense they're not going to move through it in a I think. They'll practice how they use it but. We're. Not it's not prescriptive in the sense that you know this, is how you use this tool there's. Lots of ways to access the data and the information we. Will be testifying, you, know we're functioning as expert witnesses. And. So originally. There. Was talk about me. Going to Kiev to testify and ultimately. I'm able to do it from the consulate Ukrainian consulate here. In, New York rather so. I'll be providing testimony, Michael Knox the the, audio specialists, will be providing testimony. But. We've been working very closely with them so they're intimately, familiar with the, platform the tools and the. Again. I can't emphasize that enough it's not like they they. Didn't they. Didn't know what they're asking for they had a hard drive and a problem the. Actual, deliverable. Came out of many many conversations and, I should also say like, this. Work is is funded. By. Human. Rights funders, so MacArthur. Foundation's, Human Rights Division open. Society foundation, oak Foundation and the the, mandate is methodological so, we're. Not thematic, and geographical. Like many. Rights creeps maybe but. We're about methods and so. We're. Sort of stretching to kind of think about new territory, and new uses even beyond what might actually be necessary in the legal context, so the. Answer is I don't know exactly how they're going to use it it, will have a second life also in advocacy it'll become public, and then. Probably. Have a very interesting relationship to, the courtroom after that as well. Thank. You very much for this. Ie. Myself, participated. In my, done. But. Did. Some research during, the 18th or 13th. - to the 21st.
And. You. Know had a chance. To. Observe. What. Was going on. Through. Life. I, was. You, know I have a comment, and and. A question a, comment, is that. I'm. Sorry I'm a bit touched. By this. And this is my. Idea. That I want to say that, this. Works, very. Strongly. Emotionally. At. Two levels not only is this, you know actual, deaths actually blood. But. We're kind of used to you know days also. It's just, very powerful, way, of reconstructing. What was you know and and and bringing, back. Memories. And experiences and. A. Question, is you know what was going to be done with you. Know, will. Will. You. Present. It as as a piece. Of art so, what's. Going to happen, with this material and. Once. The, talk, the. Trial you. Know the presentation, - you mentioned, tomorrow one as, well out here, seminar. I believe it's in this building okay yeah. To. Be honest with you I'm ambivalent, about, it, existing, in an art context. Ambivalent. About the aesthetic dimension of it I'm, ambivalent about the, seductive. Nature. Of the. Representational. Strategies because I think they are effective, in that sense. And. That. That ambivalence I think is, represents. A certain reluctance. For. It to live, so. We're not made for the art context, for it to even live here I have mixed feelings about it. It's. Its utility, and its destination is has always been in court and we're always. You. Know we're taking you. Know we weren't there I've never been there, we're, doing this work entirely remotely, and so we really are. Deferential. Not, just kind of like we don't know we, need to understand, a practical sense but also from a kind of sensitivities. To the material sense what. Pablo and Alexandre think is, helpful and, what is not and where, it gets slippery is advocacy. Because. I think the court the court context is very clear there's a legal argument that's being made and. That's that's pretty clear in terms of advocacy, that's. When you start to get many, narratives being mobilized many, it's being co-opted, potentially by different, people people with different agendas and I think. That's going to be part of this and I think we also have to find it really trusted, partner Paul and Alex have been too busy to worry. About that but. They. They. Think it's important that it gets out there but I think what we need to do is find a trusted, partner who can do it in the right way. Who's. Familiar with the Ukrainian, context, and, what it means so I don't. Know if that entirely answers your question but. There's. No other kind of plans. For. The life of this in the art and we even the process of making the video for it so we had to think about okay this is going to be in a museum now. What. Does it average video does it visitor need to see how do you get take someone through what was a really complex event and that, was a very interesting process and you know while I was in, some sense reluctant, I'm really glad we did it and I'm also very, grateful. For the kind of discourse that comes out, of these kind of contexts because it's you, know I'm presenting this at the American. Association for the Advancement of science or I'm at Columbia, Law School or on a funder. Or something like that but. These. Are different conversations, in. Terms of the art the art context, and they're important, to. Me. Thank. You so much I'm, really eager to see the. Work again. In the exhibition, now that you've. Explained. How it's made and I. Just I'm hoping you can say a little bit more about the, future, uses. That, you alluded to in, your you, know your remarks after the talk you. Know what what. Applications. Do. You foresee and and kind. Of how, do you, see. The. Work being received, differently. As evidence. In the, courts you know pushing more towards. The side of analysis or are you more comfortable in the realm of presentation. Okay. That's two question really good questions um I'll, take the second one first I think. We've. Sort. Of figured out a strategy for dealing with the, expertise. Question, the analysis, part of this which is that you. Know most of the work we except. For the audio latency part we did ourselves but. Having. It vetted by a friend. An expert. Is. An important part of any other really important the critical part to making sure it's not thrown out of court is, having a credential.
Forensics. Person on the team so. Michael Knox is that person and he can. Stand. In for all of it if he needs to and so that that insures that it's not going to be thrown out of hand. In. Terms of other applications, for it I also. I should also say we're. Deeply, invested in the analytical component we see huge potential there when. When when forensics, people have been working forensics, for 20 and 30 years tell you that they haven't seen, things combined like this before that I think to me is. A sign that we're onto something. So, we're too invested in that that in, terms of other applications. And. I think anywhere where you have a complex, event, probably. In an urban context, where there's a lot of citizen. Documentation. I think. This tool is potentially useful it's, not all automated. There's a lot of bespoke components, of it but. Even searching. Spatially. Temporally, a video archive hugely. Useful whether. It's protests. In the US or something. You, know in relation to black lives matter or, something domestically I mean I think we'd really like to do something domestically, tense everything we've done has been for, some reason international. But. I foresee. Future applications, in that in, that regard. Agencies. People's or entities, when they see that this type of complex, documentation. Can be. You. Know produced, and may post an action, you know evidence, in this way it strikes me that it might make some, entities. Think twice about how, they're gonna behave that's, that's the that's. A, aspiration. I think. Seems, quite logical I mean we did a project on drones civilian casualties from drone strikes for the UN and. Even. Just rendering you know the kind of a. Lot. Of the drone strikes were happening in the federally administered tribal areas. In Pakistan. It's. Just not, a lot of information coming out of there and and. I think the the, administration, was, operating, because in a certain way because there's not a lot of information. Coming out of there and so when you're when you're rendering, visible, or shedding light on something that was previously. Not. Seen. It, has that potential to change behavior. I don't want to overstate. The efficacy, of it but it is definitely the ambition of the work. For. Sure yeah. And. I. Yeah. So. On that, note um. Where. We see like what, you, know a profound. Ambivalence. By. Authorities, towards. Increasing. Amounts of evidence of things like this. What. Comes to mind to me is that you're. The. Only thing that makes us different is, that. Ease. Of use but also the sort, of seduction, and the, aesthetic. Allure of something. Like this which you say that you're concerned about. Do. You see that becoming an issue. In. A situation, in which like, the legitimacy, of this is very much rooted in its its aesthetics, as much as it is anything else. So, I'm wondering if you have anything to say buzzes yeah thank you for that question cuz it I lost my train of thought you brought right back. One. Of the more interesting places have had the opportunity to present this work was at. Quantico. At the Marines. Futures. Directorate, I think it's also known as the, warfare. Lab futures futures warfare, lab or something would, they think about the kind of future of warfare and they were doing a symposium on urban environments, and, they. Invited somebody who knows about transportation and somebody who's an, urbanist.
Who Works in Africa and. They. Were interested in this stuff and that. Was exactly what I got out of that there was a lot of, this is this. Is a problem for us you. Know how. Are we supposed to do our job if everything we do is gonna be, scrutinized. In this way. So. It. Was I wouldn't say was a hostile audience but, it was I mean the conversation went to body cams it went to a. Bit. Different a completely different, logic, and. It. Was really interesting to get that that, that perspective. In. Terms of I just wanna be clear about the question of ambivalence, I'm not I'm not in billon about the. Fact that this is ducted. I'm. Just, aware of that I'm Evelyn, about the aestheticization. Of it I'm ambivalent, about the. Removal of meaning from this work, or. The, kind of replacement of meaning that it's not open. To interpretation. The, way I think, about art as being at. Least I mean it is of course but I don't see it that way that's, what I'm that's what I'm doing. Thanks. So much for your taxes, fascinating. I'm. Wondering a. Little. Bit on form so hopefully, it's not total word salad if, you could talk, a little bit about. The. Questions, of usability, and, I imagine that the building a platform like. This kind of presents a challenge. Of. Finding. A balance between, familiar. Navigation. Forms. And kind. Of. Understanding. You know coming to this understanding, how you would normally. Navigate. Through some digital. Platform. Layouts. Are familiar, and things like that but also getting. People to really look closely and register, things, you. Know there's a tendency to sort of go into autopilot looking. At digital materials, sometimes and so how do you kind of find a balance between. Familiarity. And. Sort. Of. Close. Looking, yeah, that's a really really good question. So. I think the Clos the familiarity, you, know that what we're used to seeing is driven largely by. By. This more. And more in terms of conventions, of how we. Make. Digital content so this mobile first scenario, and the New York Times does incredible graphics work but it it's, always driven by something like this and in fact some of those drawings are gonna be very very hard to see or the archive for example the query that way and so we're trying to fill a space that's not the. Same as that this. Is a tool which can be. Lent. Itself to a deeper dive can, be used by lawyers in a very specific way and then, can also sort, of also be disseminated in the public it's not it this projects not about advocacy firs
2018-06-07 14:46
