Encoding Signals - Writing the Alien

Event details

This seminar will take a closer look at Carter's recent work Signals, published by Guillemot Press in 2022, and some of his related work. Signals is a speculative work of poetry written using Lincos, a mathematical language designed for messaging extra-terrestrials. The exercise raises fundamental questions about the nature of writing, in any medium, and what it means to even attempt to speak to the non-human. This talk will unpack some of the structural aspects of Carter's Signals, as well as delve into the fascinating histories of devising and sending messages to the cosmos - reflecting on what these really say about us, as we attempt to make sense of ourselves as beings of Earth.

About the speaker

Richard Carter

Richard A Carter is an artist and lecturer in Digital Culture at the University of York. Carter is interested in examining the more-than-human within digital activities, objects, and environments. Carter’s research is embedded within his artistic practice, meditating on the potentialities of sensing, knowing, and writing at the intersection between human and machinic actors.