Watching Machines is a three-day exhibition and public programme on algorithmic vision: facial recognition, biometric remote identification and behavioural-analysis systems (emotions, gait, movement) are increasingly woven into the infrastructure of public space. Bringing together four years of work from the ERC-funded Security Vision project, it gathers films, installations, and interactive data works by Cyan Bae, Francesco Ragazzi, and Ruben van de Ven, alongside a public programme of conversations with policy makers, artists, researchers, and activists.
The exhibition asks a set of plain questions. Where are these systems deployed, and by whom? On what data are they trained, and through what kinds of human labour? What do they get wrong, and what does that error reveal? And what would it mean to look back at the machines that are looking at us?
Free entry. All welcome.
Mapping the Field of Security Vision
Two interactive visualisations from the Security Vision project mapping the global use of algorithmic surveillance systems. Using research data and interviews, the works explore where these technologies operate and how they shape contemporary security.
Welcome to Set
Cyan Bae, 2026, experimental short documentary. The film reenacts how AI emotion-recognition systems are trained, exposing the transformation of human expression into machine-readable data for security applications.
Work in Progress Shorts
Two upcoming shorts by Cyan Bae exploring queer and feminist responses to emotional AI and surveillance systems.
An Algorithm of Violence
Francesco Ragazzi, work-in-progress documentary. Following the development of a violence detection algorithm, the film questions how machines are taught to recognise violence and whose experiences become visible.
Perplexity
Ruben van de Ven, media installation. The work predicts and projects visitors’ movements in real time, revealing how surveillance systems construct ideas of normality and suspicion.
Wednesday 18 June evening: Opening drinks and exhibition preview.
Thursday 19 June: Exhibition open to the public.
Friday 20 June, all day Public programme: an afternoon of conversations with policy makers, artists, researchers, and activists on the politics of algorithmic vision. Full programme to be announced early June.
Watching Machines presents work from Security Vision: The Algorithmic Security Politics of Computer Vision, an ERC Consolidator Grant project (2020–2025) led by Francesco Ragazzi at the Institute of Political Science, Leiden University. The project investigates the political, social, and aesthetic dimensions of computer vision systems used in security, combining critical security studies with practice-based and multimodal research methods.
Artists & researchers: Cyan Bae · Francesco Ragazzi · Ruben van de Ven
Supported by: European Research Council · Leiden University · The Grey Space in the Middle · ReCNTR