nAture and tEChnOLOGY – incompatible or dependent on each other?

Building on the annual programme of Prater Digital on digital sustainability, this panel talk aims to discuss the relationship between the Anthropocene and digitalisation. With experts from science and the arts, we will examine the negative impacts of technological forms of expression and applications of artificial intelligence on the climate and environment.

Our focus is on the art sector, where the use of digital applications such as extended reality technologies and artificial intelligence to create new non-physical experiences is becoming increasingly popular. Often, the immersive experiences created using these technologies address pressing questions about nature and climate catastrophe. This creates a point of friction between the themes being addressed and the means used, which has received little attention so far.

We will explore whether these technologies can also develop a more sustainable perspective on the relationship between nature and technology or if they rather create an illusion of a symbiotic connection that is not realised in reality.

Where do genuinely symbiotic and sustainable connections between nature and technology emerge? Where can technology serve as a voice and tool for nature? And how do we deal with the contradiction that artistic-digital works on themes such as biodiversity are not automatically sustainable?

We will adopt ethical, political, and artistic perspectives with our guests, focusing on the fundamental question of how digital sustainability addresses the contradictions of digital society and digital visualisation practices.