This retrospective features Hershman Leeson’s complete, four-part “Cyborg Series,” including Cyborgian Rhapsody – Immortality (2023), which was written, performed, and designed by an artificial intelligence chatbot. A special conversation on June 8, 2024 brings together Lynn Hershman Leeson, Eugenia Kuyda, founder of the Replika AI app, and the chatbot named Echo.

“In her video Seduction of a Cyborg (1994), technology is illustrated as an infectious disease that destroys a woman’s immune system. A blind protagonist agrees to receive physical treatment to restore her eyesight through a computer’s electronic transmission. During the process, she is seduced into a computer-simulated world and gradually becomes addicted to its algorithm. Ultimately, her addiction leads to the manipulation and breakdown of her body.”