The Mathematics of Regression
Clément Lambelet, Valentin Woeffray
To create the series of images The Mathematics of Regression, Clément Lambelet gathered more than 55,000 “mugshots” from a database of photo IDs collected by the American justice system. This database, which is used to creates artificial intelligence systems for facial recognition, was assembled according to the systematically discriminatory norms of the judicial system. In order to turn these images away from their original purpose, and to bring to light the dangers in how they are used, Lambelet created an AI to sort them by gender and age. The resulting portraits are the stereotypes that emerge from this database. Thanks to superposition of images and lenticular prints that leave the subjects unidentifiable, the algorithmic suspects remain anonymous. In a society of control, this work brings to light the dangers that the abuse of images represents for our individual liberties.
The portrait series is accompanied by Reassuring White Noises, a video created in collaboration with Valentin Woeffray. Resonating with the theme of technological power and its racist biases, the video concentrates on political and media power, and examines the public apologies that typically follow a racist act or proposal: the gestures of the politicians, influencers and celebrities, what they say and what they don’t say, are analyzed to show how these speeches are performative and empty of meaning.
Thanks to a collaboration with Belgrade Photo Month, the work The Mathematics of Regression by Clément Lambelet will be presented from 30.3 to 27.4.23 in Belgrade, Serbia.
With the support of : Pro Helvetia / Ville de Genève – Département de la culture et de la transition numérique / Polygravia
Year of production : 2019-2023
