Rencontre with Mark O’Connell

Just a few days before the first performance of To Be a Machine at the CENTQUATRE-PARIS (see below), we are pleased to welcome – virtually – the writer behind the show, Mark O’Connell! A journalist and essayist, Mark talks tonight about his eponymous book, translated into French as Aventures chez les transhumanistes (Editions L'échappée, 2018). He is fascinated by the transhumanist movement and has interviewed numerous of its followers as well as exploring different sites where plans for immortality are being developed. He also touches on his latest Notes from an Apocalypse (2020), a personal and meditative quest that combines the chilling with the irreverent.

From 9 October 2021 to 9 January 2022, the international festival of digital arts « Némo – Biennale internationale des arts numériques de la Région Ile-de-France » presents exhibitions, shows, performances, concerts and discussions. The theme this year is "Au-delà du réel ? Révéler l’invisible par les arts numériques, les sciences et les technologies”. Beyond reality? Revealing the invisible through digital arts, science and technology.

As part of this festival, from Wednesday 15 to Sunday 19 December, the CENTQUATRE-PARIS is hosting To Be a Machine (version 1.0), presented by the Irish theatre company Dead Centre. For the duration of the evening, the audience becomes part of a fusion of theatre and machine. An exciting and unusual experience that will take place in public but that can only be viewed online, through the magic of digital technology… On stage, surrounded by an artillery of high-tech devices, Jack Gleeson (Game of Thrones) explains the wonders of transhumanism, in a world where the human being is but a technological animal…

Details and reservations To Be a Machine (version 1.0) : www.biennalenemo.fr/event/dead-centre-to-be-a-machine-version-1-0/