The Luxury of Protest

The Luxury of Protest¹ is a research platform focussed on computational history, archaeo-informatics, and generative visualisation. Employing spatial and temporal archaeological data analysis, projects² examine history through knowledge discovery, machine learning, and computational statistical approaches. Data quantified objects are used to discover and elucidate patterns, trends and relationships between events and material phenomena³ across hidden and heterogeneous axes.

Peter Crnokrak is a Berlin computation artist, designer and researcher. Peter holds a doctorate in computational science and has lectured at a number of international institutions including the Royal College of Art, London College of Communication and Sint-Lukas School of Design. In 2010, he was elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in acknowledgment of internationally <a href="url">recognised</a> expertise in design and data visualisation. Currently he is <a href="url">professor</a> and programme director of the Visual & Experience Design, and Generative Design & AI master's at UE Germany.
Peter Crnokrak's <a href="url">publications</a> include over 125 books, journals and magazines. He has won a number of international <a href="url">competitions</a> including The Webbys, AIGA 365, German Design Award, International Society of Typographic Designers, and the European Design Awards. His work has been <a href="url">exhibited</a> internationally including Tokyo, Paris, New York, London and Los Angeles. Peter holds two <a href="url">patents</a> in systems design for object-oriented data visualisation.
Focussing on the extremes of societal behaviour as a means by which to characterise the human condition, the practice is an experimental platform that utilises computational methodologies to communicate meaning in complex systems with work integrating research, data mining and statistical analysis.

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Underground Resistance is a seminal Detroit techno collective that has been producing music since the early 1990s. “A label for a movement”, at it’s core the outfit is run by Mike Banks with former members including internationally renowned producers Rob Hood and Jeff Mills. Sonically and politically militant in its direction, the collective has focused on themes of race relations and black power – while at the same time having an expansive outlook in celestial dreams of a universal infinite. The cosmos plays an important role in music produced by UR – with record titles such as “Galaxy 2 Galaxy”, “Interstellar Fugitives” and “DayStar Rising”.

UR maps the entire Underground Resistance catalog using images of coronal mass ejections that occurred in the year each record was released. The solar ejections are scaled by an influence metric to measure the cultural penetrance of each record.¹ The visualisation is a composite of 123 images of solar flares produced by our sun that have occurred over a 23 year period : 1990 to 2012 – sourced from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory library.²

The concept for the visualisation is a recognition of the reciprocal nature of universal influence : electromagnetic pulses bombard the earth from solar flares, while electromagnetic radio waves from earth travel at the speed of light through interstellar space. Geomagnetic pulses exploding from coronal mass ejections reach the earth on a regular basis and are known to affect biological processes. Even deep space events such as stars going supernova 100s of light years away are believed to have had profound affects on the planet – one of which resulted in a mass extinction event 65 million years ago. Conversely, it is entirely conceivable that sonic communication signals produced on planet Earth, emanating as electromagnetic waves, reach the deepest edges of the cosmos and are potentially heard by the inhabitants of other worlds.³

UR is a metaphor for celestial reciprocity – the recognition of the interconnectedness of all matter and action in the cosmos.

Each record is scaled by a three-factor quantitative measure that is a weighted average of play count results from music streaming platforms (Youtube, Spotify and Apple Music), a monetary value rank from Discogs, and specialised music forum mentions. The various metrics compose an overall cultural influence value for each release.
Images of the sun come from NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory – a program designed to understand the causes of solar variability and its impacts on Earth.
From the article Why We Keep Sending Music to Extraterrestrials : “When Carl Sagan set about designing the Voyager Golden Record, he understood humanity’s first musical interstellar message was unlikely to ever be intercepted by an extraterrestrial intelligence. Nevertheless, he recognized that ‘launching this bottle into the cosmic ocean says something very hopeful about life on this planet.’ The same holds true for all future musical interstellar messages, even if our terrestrial melodies never grace an extraterrestrial ear.”

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Twilight Sleep explores the intimate relationship between chemistry and creativity in 19th and 20th century literature. The project maps mass spectrum chemical signatures of various narcotic, entheogenic and psychedelic drugs to qualitative characterisations of literary output¹ to elucidate potential patterns of causation.

Mass spectrum analysis reveals the elemental or isotopic signature of compounds and is sensitive enough to elucidate the chemical structure of molecules. The complexity of a drug as well as its isotope distribution is revealed as a distinct fragmentation pattern of banding in the visualisations; white bands indicate isotopic peaks, while rotational smears indicate the duration of effect. The chemical signatures in turn determine the characteristic effects that a drug has on the mind and body.

The pattern of banding in the visualisation allows one to see the commonality between different drugs (especially the opioid narcotics and psychedelics), but also allows one to correlate the drug’s molecular composition to the tone of writing used by the author. In general, utopian² and dystopian³ authors share little with regard to their predilections toward certain drugs.

An intriguing question remains : to what degree does the distinct chemical signature of a drug and its subsequent unique effect on the brain, determine the philosophical composition of literature?

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J. Radenkova-Saeva (2008) Recreational Drugs and its Impact on Music Literature and Art, Biotechnology & Biotechnological Equipment, 22:2, 656-659, DOI: 10.1080/13102818.2008.10817530
Mescaline _ Aldous Huxley, Island 1962 : “As Mind at Large seeps past the no longer watertight valve, all kinds of biologically useless things start to happen. In some cases there may be extra-sensory perceptions. Other persons discover a world of visionary beauty. To others again is revealed the glory, the infinite value and meaningfulness of naked existence.... In the final stage of egolessness there is an 'obscure knowledge' that All is in all—that All is actually each.”
Ether _ Aleister Crowley, Clouds Without Water 1909 : “Invaluable for mental analysis; also to discover one's own final judgment on any matter. Gives the power to appreciate the elements of which sensation is made up.”
Nitrous oxide _ Theodore Dreiser, Laughing Gas 1914 : “...the clearest most concise expression of the cosmic balance of conflicting forces believed to determine life.”
Morphine _ Elizabeth Barrett Browning, A Essay on Mind, with Other Poems 1826 : “I have been calling it my amreeta draught, my elixir—because the tranquilizing power has been wonderful.”
LSD _ J.G. Ballard, High-Rise 1975 : “I had such a negative trip, a real paranoid journey of despair. It was over in a day, but little vents of hell went on opening for years afterward, as I gather they do.”
Semoxydrine _ Philip K. Dick, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? 1968 : “My major preoccupation is the question, 'What is reality?' Many of my stories and novels deal with psychotic states or drug-induced states by which I can present the concept of a multiverse rather than a universe.”
Oxycodone _ William S. Burroughs, Nova Express 1964 : “I tried it as a matter of curiosity.”
Cocaine _ Robert Louis Stevenson, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde 1886 : “That an invalid in my husband's condition of health should have been able to perform the manual labour alone of putting 60,000 words on paper in six days, seems almost incredible.”
Thujone _ Arthur Rimbaud, Illuminations 1886 : “A poet makes himself a visionary through a long, boundless, and systematized disorganization of all the senses. All forms of love, of suffering, of madness; he searches himself, he exhausts within himself all poisons, and preserves their quintessences. Unspeakable torment, where he will need the greatest faith, a superhuman strength, where he becomes all men the great invalid, the great criminal, the great accursed--and the Supreme Scientist!”

UR
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TWILIGHT SLEEP
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APOCALYPSES
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UR.V2

TWILIGHT SLEEP Nº 2

APOCALYPSES RE- VISIONED

UR
.V2

TWILIGHT SLEEP
Nº 2

APOCALYPSES
RE-
VISIONED