Art & Tech Café | Can technology bring us closer together?

Technology is becoming ever more intimately involved in our lives and has enormous potential to bring us closer together. But can technology truly offer an intimate experience? Perhaps even replace an intimate partner? Or will technology stand in the way between us and others? Join us in exploring how art and technology may challenge what it means to be human and augment our experience of love for each other and for the world.
Laura A Dima is a multidisciplinary artist based in Amsterdam. In her project Future Affair she explores our experience of touch. Future Affair redefines the way we view art by bringing physical contact into the experience, while at the same time raising questions about the role of touch in society. Can we create affectionate touch without human contact?
Maaike van der Horst is a PhD candidate in Philosophy of Technology at the University of Twente. Her research focuses on how sex robots can shed a different light on inter-human sexuality and intimacy, and how inter-human sexuality and intimacy might change due to the influence of sex robots.
Daniel “Dan” Shor is a Berlin-based designer, researcher, and mechanical engineer exploring the link between emotionality and touch experiences. Describing himself as an Human Experience Design Engineer, he blends human contact and experiential context to build the future of haptic technology, focusing on developing devices that stimulate human connection and behaviours through vibrotactile feedback.
The event will be moderated by Desiree Hoving.
Art & Tech Café
In the Art & Tech Café we invite artists who work on the intersection of art and technology to explore pressing social issues by means of their art. Like technology, art can provide us with a fresh pair of eyes through which we can experience reality in new and unexpected ways. And discover things we may not have known before. Join us to explore new paradigms and perspectives!