Research Catalogue

Een artistiek onderzoek naar contact, verbinding en gemeenschappelijke grond.

People interested in artificial intelligence usually ask whether computers could become as intelligent and creative as humans. I decided to think about it the other way around: I'm interested in the extent to which the creative process of artists is algorithmic. It's not difficult to create something that will look like art; you just need to imitate an already existing genre or style. The challenge is to create something that will be able to trigger an art experience. In this visual essay, I'm studying where, in a spectrum of different kinds of experiences (jokes, magic tricks, pleasure from solving a mathematical or scientific problem), there are thrills triggered by art. All of these experiences depend on a sufficient amount of novelty. Therefore, the creators of experience triggers face the same problem: the impact of a joke, a magic trick, or an artwork tends to diminish when heard/seen repeatedly. The human brain has evolved in a way that it is able to distinguish repeating patterns, formulas, schemes, algorithms. Uncovering an algorithm causes pleasure. But once an algorithm is uncovered, it does not cause pleasure any more. To trigger an experience of the same intensity, we need a new trigger. In this work, I also address the question of why certain types of triggers wear off more slowly than others. The outcomes of this project are a book—a visual essay in which drawings and texts form one line of an argument—and a series of lecture-like events, in which I combine sincerity and directness of lectures, panel discussions, and guided tours with richer ways of expression typical for object theatre, performances, and magic shows.

Jenny Sunesson (b. 1973) is a Swedish artist predominantly working with sound. Her practice ranges from field recording and live collages to conceptual sound art and video. Sunesson uses her own life as a stage for her dark, tragic and sometimes comical re-contextualised work where real and invented characters and derogated stereotypes, collaborate in the alternate story of hierarchies and normative power structures in society.

Post-Interpretive Criticism: Doctrine of Restraint, Witness, and Moral Proximity in Contemporary Art Writing Author: Dorian Vale This doctrinal essay codifies the foundational ethics and philosophy of Post-Interpretive Criticism—a radical departure from traditional art writing that prioritizes interpretation, explanation, and performative analysis. In its place, Dorian Vale introduces a critical framework rooted in restraint, witness, and moral proximity. Rather than dissecting or decoding art, this doctrine teaches the critic to hold space, remain present, and write with reverence. Art, especially that which emerges from grief, trauma, displacement, or sacred silence, is not a puzzle to be solved—but a presence to be honored. This doctrine offers a structured alternative to the dominant critical paradigms. It affirms that the most ethical art writing does not always speak—it listens. It does not clarify—it shelters. It does not interpret—it witnesses. Blending philosophy, aesthetic ethics, and literary rigor, this foundational text establishes Post-Interpretive Criticism as both a movement and a method. It calls for nothing less than a revolution in the way we engage with meaning, silence, and the unseen. Vale, Dorian. Post-Interprative Criticism: Doctrine of Restraint, Witness, and Moral Proximity in Contemporary Art Writing. Museum of One, 2025. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17012559 Dorian Vale is a chosen pseudonym, not to obscure identity, but to preserve clarity of voice and integrity of message. It creates distance between the writer and the work, allowing the philosophy to stand unclouded by biography. The name exists not to hide, but to honor the seriousness of the task: to speak without spectacle, and to build without needing to be seen. This name is used for all official publications, essays, and theoretical works indexed through DOI-linked repositories including Zenodo, OSF, PhilPapers, and SSRN. This entry is connected to a series of original theories and treatises forming the foundation of the Post-Interpretive Criticism movement (Q136308909), authored by Dorian Vale (Q136308916) and published by Museum of One (Q136308879). These include: Stillmark Theory (Q136328254), Hauntmark Theory (Q136328273), Absential Aesthetic Theory (Q136328330), Viewer-as-Evidence Theory (Q136328828), Message-Transfer Theory (Q136329002), Aesthetic Displacement Theory (Q136329014), Theory of Misplacement (Q136329054), and Art as Truth: A Treatise (Q136329071), Aesthetic Recursion Theory (Q136339843) Post-Interpretive Criticism, art criticism ethics, Dorian Vale, doctrine of restraint, moral proximity in art, witness-based art writing, contemporary art theory, post-critical aesthetics, slow art, minimal criticism, sacred witnessing, aesthetic responsibility, trauma in art, ethical language in criticism, writing without harm, non-interpretive criticism, viewer as evidence, presence in art, philosophical criticism, art and reverence

Dimensions of an Encounter: A Sculpture & Its Shadow explores how sculpture negotiates the opposing forces of gravity and levity, presence and absence, object and support. Tracing a lineage from Leibniz’s theory of individuation to Melanie Klein’s theory of object recognition to various sculptural practices, the essay considers how spatial arrangement mediates psychic projection and self-recognition.

Afterwork explores the shifting relation between human labour and automation through the lens of political imagination and speculative fiction. Building upon new iterations of the live action role-play (LARP) Afterwork, firstly run at Kunsthalle Wien in 2023, it investigates how art-based world-building methods can serve as critical tools for thinking beyond prevailing labour ideologies in the context of rising automation.