Paratactic Media and Social Networks

Emerging Forms of Resistance to Algorithmic Power in Artistic Practices

Abstract

This article deploys the concept of ‘paratactic media’ to define emerging practices which exploit the logic of algorithmic governance in subversive artistic interventions as a means to expose and contest authoritarian regimes of power. By means of an engagement with the works of Istanbul-based artists during the 2013 Gezi Park Resistance in Turkey, the essay explores the ways in which paratactic media are able to uncover and remediate the invisible layers of algorithmic regulation through aesthetics of friction, cacophony, foolishness, depletion and waste.