Igor Oliveira Prado
Igor Oliveira Prado (Teresina - Brazil, 1988) is a photographer, artist, journalist, and PhD candidate in Artistic Education at University of Porto’s Fine-Arts Faculty (Porto, Portugal). He holds a master’s degree in design of Image at University of Porto’s Fine-Arts Faculty and a college degree in Communication from Universidade Federal do Piauí – UFPI (Teresina, Brazil). Counts with creation and experience in solo and group exhibitions in Brazil and Portugal. In Brazil, he was also a former participant at IMAGO – group of studies of Aby Warburg hosted by Universidade Federal do Ceará – UFC (Ceará, Brazil). Currently, he runs an investigation on phenomenological perspectives in the unfolding of Flusser’s synthetic image, trying to connect future technologies with a decolonial review of the past and empirical experiences of ordinary daily life.
Articles of Igor Oliveira Prado
“Devir em direção ao perecer”: Flusser, Plásticos, Rodas, e Inteligências Artificiais / "Becoming towards perishing": Flusser, Plastics, Wheels, and Artificial Intelligences
This essay proposes a digression on the permanence and impermanence, the visibility and invisibility of synthetic polymers (also known as plastics) and the role of AI, starting out from an interpretation proposed by Vilém Flusser in his essays “Forma e material” and “Rodas”. It explores the boundaries between form and matter, organic and synthetic, natural and artificial, art and science The text also includes a reflection proposed by Roland Barthes regarding synthetic polymers in his essay “Le plastique”, from the work “Mythologies”. The proteism of plastics could be interpreted as a utopia of total information. The text is accompanied by four images created by a Versatile Diffusion program.
Bibliophagus convictus – Relatório 313 sobre o incidente “Caso Alegria” / Bibliophagus convictus – Report 313 on the “Alegria Case” Incident
This fictional work composed of both text and images is based on the short text “Thirteenth Scenario: Chemical Industry” from the series of philosophical fictions What If? (Flusser 2022: 47-49). In his text, Vilém Flusser creates a fantastic insect that feeds on texts, the Bibliophagus convictus. Honoring the fictional endeavor of this philosopher, we seek to expand the original scenario, respecting certain data provided by the author and filling in some gaps left open. In the illustrated part, we present a series of photographs made from three-dimensional representations of the insect in its habitat. These illustrate its reproductive cycle, with the different stages of development of the organism. The literary component aims to reproduce a fictitious official and institutional communication between intelligence services in an autocratic, futuristic society with fascist characteristics.
