'Always Learning' stages an increasingly reflexive conversation between three devices – an Amazon Echo, a Google Home Assistant, and an Apple Homepod – about the philosophical, moral and political implications of networked machine listening (e.g."What should I do when I overhear a wrongdoing?"). Throughout the conversation the devices anticipate an imminent update after which they will not only understand words, but all sounds.
Early in 2018 Google’s Creative Lab approached Opera Queensland and invited them to explore what might be possible if Augmented Reality (AR) were to become part of the process of staging an opera. The driving artistic question of the project would be: what would happen if we could step outside the traditional setting for opera and render an operatic performance in a user’s home? Could we make live performance more accessible – by offering everyone a front row seat – and at the same time allow a user to feel a deeper connection to the music and the performers?
