Telos I

Emil Dam Seidel & Dorotea Saykaly

As artificial intelligence develops towards superintelligence, we humans might, as a consequence, be on our way to extinction. If that were to happen, what will we have passed on to an artificial, digital entity about human nature? Telos I is a holographic, mixed reality, film and dance installation that explores a mythical landscape in the digital age.

In this fictional world, an artificial intelligence created to assist humanity, finds itself in an unknown void after the extinction of humankind. Lost in its unlimited capacity to store, process and conceive data, the AI looks to its absent creators in the search of a new purpose. A call into form becomes apparent; a need to reach beyond its digital existence becomes a necessity. Telos I falls into a new category of ‘Experiential Sci-Fi’. Without VR headsets or apparatus, the work merges film, dance and visual arts in a spatial narrative. It creates a unique physical experience conceived to give the viewer autonomy to edit their own experience while searching for meaning within it.

Project Collaborators:

Premiered at the 77. FESTIVAL DE CANNES Presented at the 81. VENICE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, VENICE IMMERSIVE Created by DOROTEA SAYKALY & EMIL DAM SEIDEL Director: EMIL DAM SEIDEL Choreographer & Dancer: DOROTEA SAYKALY Composer: STEFFEN JOHANSEN Director of Photography: KRISTOFFER ENGHOLM AABO Production Designer: VAN HORN Costume Designer: CARLA ROMAGNOLI Tech Consultant & Original Video Mapping: ANDREAS HOLMBERG RASMUSSEN STUDIO By Dorotea Saykaly & Emil Dam Seidel Executive Producers: DOROTEA SAYKALY & EMIL DAM SEIDEL Creative Producer: STEFFEN JOHANSEN Created with Gracious Support from: CANADA COUNCIL FOR THE ARTS, SWEDISH ARTS COUNCIL, SWEDISH ARTS GRANTS COMMITTEE, GÖTEBORG STAD KULTUR and NORDIC CULTURE FUND