Quantum Knowledge: States, Systems, Fictions is a symposium dedicated to reconsidering the social and the scientific together. Beginning from those quantum discoveries and tools that allow us to sense the world in a deeper and more relational way, we might examine the inherent possibilities of quantum knowledge to preserve and expand the values we believe in as integral to a democratic society.

As Karen Barad, keynote speaker of this symposium, notes: “The so-called uncertainty principle in quantum physics is not a matter of ‘uncertainty’ at all but rather of indeterminacy.” If scientific and technological revolutions are often victims of unfortunate appropriations that expose them only as a danger to the social good and our planetary contract, we believe that with the help of good science, such nascent technologies and new forms of intelligence need not be placed in opposition to art, equity, and justice. Over the course of two days at Institute Art Gender Nature HGK Basel FHNW, a gathering of esteemed thinkers, physicists, artists, composers, computer scientists, curators, and technologists will discuss how quantum ideas and practices have irrevocably shaped their work and their thinking—artistic or otherwise—and how they might alter our own.

Quantum Knowledge: States, Systems, Fictions is held in conjunction with the UN’s International Year of Quantum Science and Technology.

The symposium is dedicated to the memory of Alan Longino and Yutaka Matsuzawa.

Location: Institute Art Gender Nature HGK Basel FHNW
On-site and online
Auditorium D 1.04, HGK Basel FHWN
→ LIVESTREAM

As part of the symposium series Gender and Equality in the Arts

With contributions by Karen Barad, Mónica Bello, Johanna Bruckner, Mayte Gómez Molina, Adam Haar Horowitz, Nicole L’Huillier, Amanda E. Metzger, Manaswi Mishra, Jenna Sutela, Spencer Topel and James Wootton, and Suzanne Treister

Moderated by Chus Martínez and Quinn Latimer
Research: Marion Ritzmann

The symposium is open to the public and will be held in English. Free admission.