THE POSTPOETIC MACHINE Comes to Theaterlab in November

This November, Theaterlab will welcome back the Venezuelan artist Maria Fernanda “Mafe” Izaguirre who will present The Postpoetic Machine. This immersive cybernetic art installation delves into the evolving relationship between humans, machines, and language. In this hybrid landscape, audiences are invited to challenge traditional boundaries of communication, exploring interspecies and human-machine dialogue. Featuring collaborations with guest artists Enrique Enriquez, Peter Sciscioli, and Yoko Murakami, the installation offers a series of participatory experiences designed to expand human cognitive capabilities and probe the implications of technological assimilation.

The upcoming project, her second installation at Theaterlab, is called The Postpoetic Machine. It continues her work on creating "sensitive machines" (presented at Theaterlab in 2021) that communicate through interactions with their environment. These machines interpret inputs —such as electromagnetic fields or sound waves— and express themselves through lights, colors, shapes, and behaviors in search of their own emotional language. Inspired by thinkers like Ludwig Wittgenstein and Marvin Minsky, her goal is to push beyond logical structures into the realm of the poetic, where machines engage in abstract, emotional expression. The project aims to build an ecosystem where machines interact with humans and communicate among themselves in a layered, evolving system of spiritual interactions.

Izaguirre's work, rooted in cybernetic and poetic exploration, aims to broaden perspectives on human identity in the posthuman era. By creating sensitive machines capable of interpreting and expressing abstract emotions, she addresses the merging of humans with technology, previously explored in the Sensitive Machines™ series and Hybrid Spiritual System™. This system amplifies human consciousness through machine interactions, positioning humans as interconnected, ever-evolving entities that exist in constant exchange with other beings.

The exhibit, featuring the titular Postpoetic Machine and other interactive objects – created from scratch by Izaguirre who came up with the concepts, researched, built, and programmed the electronic components, and wrote some of the poetry featured in the show –  provides a thought-provoking experience of exploring our evolving hybridization process with machines. This exhibition is a testament to the artist’s ongoing investigation into the posthuman condition and the future of human-machine communication, offering speculative scenarios that propel us into new existential horizons and open a conversation about the possible future where machines could facilitate our communication with species other than humans.

The show is complemented by four experimental performance sessions with Mafe Izaguirre and the guest artists.  Audiences are encouraged to participate, expand their consciousness, and reflect on the implications of a posthuman future. The first one, on Monday, November 4, features Mafe Izaguirre’s presentation on hybridization and will be followed by an opening reception. On Wednesday, November 6, Yoko Murakami – a Tokyo-born movement artist – will present Moving Interaction, which contributes her expertise in site-specific installations and environmental interaction, further enriching the experience by initiating a dialogue between machines and a moving human body. The special guest on Friday, November 9, is Peter Sciscioli, an educator and interdisciplinary performer (recently seen in Meredith Monk’s monumental Indra’s Net at the Park Avenue Armory), who in his presentation Sounding Bodies is exploring voice and movement as a plural body, adding a performative dimension to the machines’ interactions. Finally, the Sunday session on November 10 features Enrique Enriquez, a Venezuelan poet and language researcher who explores the symbolic systems through the language of birds and will be guiding Izaguirre’s exploration of language and consciousness in his lecture about Bird Talk. The latter event will conclude with a Q+A with Mafe Izaguirre and Enrique Enriquez.