Using face-mapping technology and real-time generative sound design, the NYC-based artist hijacks FaceTime to perform for his friends.

Freeka Tet is a multidisciplinary artist and performer who uses emergent technology, creative coding and a hacker’s approach to artistic production to make playful works that interrogate and subvert contemporary attitudes towards cultural consumption. His practice promotes, in his own words, “doing without knowing”, taking on deeply technical projects based on processes of learning and investigation, yet untethered from any specific discipline or methodology.

With 7h3 p1c7u23 0f f4c371m3, Tet puts a satirical spin on the concept of a live streamed performance, swapping larger live broadcasts to anonymous audiences for more intimate, one-on-one virtual performances for his friends. Riffing on the contemporary necessity for DJs and producers to maintain a presence on social media, 7h3 p1c7u23 0f f4c371m3 is a critique of how people use their own image. Tet uses face-mapping technology and real-time generative sound design to literally perform with his face, hijacking FaceTime to trigger sounds and images with different expressions and gestures.

During his set of internet-scraped audio bricolage, original productions and edits of Amnesia Scanner (with a cameo from their A.I. collaborator Oracle), Giant Claw and EPROM, Tet also hands the performance over to his audience, allowing them to physically participate in the immersive work in a strictly online space. In this way both the artist and the audience appear on screen as oscillating between various virtual and ‘real’ online identities, going back and forth in a schizophrenic digital dialogue.

7h3 p1c7u23 0f f4c371m3 was borne out of a live performance Tet has been working on for close to a decade that has been shown at MUTEK, Miami Art Basel and at Montreal Art Biennale 2018. The work was inspired by Daito Manabe‘s work with electrical stimuli and artists like Exonemo, Woobly and Jodi. It was developed over the years using a mixture of personal work and open source code from artists such as Jason Saragih, Arturo Castro and Kyle McDonald, among others.

Freeka would like to thank Maggie, Georgia, Kyle, Ann, Alex, Ian, Wiles, Kate, Baby Lars, Abby, Ville & Oracle, Agnes, Matthew & Momo, Miguel, Otto, AXL & Luna Chiky, Pierre-Claude, Philippa, Tyler, Charlotte & Alex, Danni, Sebac & Matchka, Cyril, Bill, Louisa, Seb & Riot, Chloe, Bente, Big Lars & Pickles, Farnazz & Setayesh, Asian Dan & Aaron, Max, Julia & Rigby, Henry and FACT Magazine for participating in this performance. Special thanks to Camille Troillard and Nicolas Livet for the massive help in the early days. You can check out the setlist below. For more information about Freeka Tet you can visit his website and follow him on Instagram.

SCRAPPED THE INTERNET AGAIN :v

EPROM – ‘Center Of The Sun’ (Busta Feat. Freeka Tet Edit)
Freeka Tet – ‘Circle.aif’
Giant Claw – ‘Softchannel 004&006’ (Freeka Tet Edit)
[BLACK MIDI] Krash Noets (6.7 Million NOETS)~TSMB2—No Lag
Amnesia Scanner –  ‘AS Truth’ (Freeka Tet Edit)
Robot mouth sings “Kagome Kagome”
Oleg Berg – “Be (!) Worry, Don’t (!) Happy”: Minor key

Kyle McDonald – Flow-Distort Shader
Nicolas Livet – C# f4c3724ck32
Bibhas Acharya – Screentime

Watch next: Cao Yuxi and Lawrence Lau transform QR codes into virtual environments with Dimensional Sampling