The Higher Men, an interactive new media installation, explores literate ways of knowing with contemporary thinkers – philosophers, new media theorists and filmmakers.

Alain Badiou, Jean Baudrillard, Judith Butler, Peter Greenaway, Jean-Luc Nancy, Larry Rickels, Wolfgang Schirmacher, Elias Sulieman, Gregory Ulmer, and Slavoj Žižek appear on a wall of screens speaking at once, creating an almost incomprehensible cacophony, until a viewer engages one of them. Each thinker reappears with the same thought or a different one “but it’s not repetition” as new juxtapositions change the context of their ideas.

Upon first entering the room the viewer is dwarfed by the big screen and hears only fragmented thoughts and disjointed sentences. Sitting on one of the cushions provided causes all but one ‘higher man’ to stop speaking allowing the viewer to fully understand what is being said. A second cushion allows a second viewer to ‘steal’ the attention away from the first viewer. While the order of the video playback is random the viewer can listen to all the conversations by putting in the time required to do so.

If no one is listening all the higher men resume speaking.

Through a touch-screen viewers can select any of the 150 questions put to the ‘higher men’. The corresponding answer is printed on register tape, which the viewer is welcome to take. This process is captured on video, stored in a database, and displayed on a single screen facing the screens of ‘higher men’.