Most of the recent debate around AI has been situated at the human-computer interface, glossing over not only the massive impact of computational technologies on the environment, but also its pervasiveness in the fundamental layers of society. The Performative Ethnographies of X is a series of site-specific participatory actions aimed at exploring advanced automation in spaces usually hidden from view, even though – or precisely because – they maintain society as we know it. With the help of a local guide(s) the participants enter the infrastructural backbones of medical centers, railway stations, greenhouses, plastic pellet factories, etc. to experience the algorithms of care put in place to sustain, control, facilitate, police and nurture human and other-than-human bodies.
