Given how much time we Angelenos spend in our cars, Lauren Lee McCarthy’s latest interactive performance, Auto, may at first feel familiar. Yet, in a world increasingly shaped by AI, the experience can also leave passengers confronting deeper questions about technological dependence and the uncertainties of automated systems.
The Los Angeles–based artist, a recipient of LACMA’s Art + Technology Lab Grant, is known for her interactive multimedia works that critically engage with themes of surveillance and social dynamics in technological environments. With projects like Saliva Bar, an installation inviting participants to exchange vials of saliva, and Surrogate, an extended performance involving an app that tracks and manages surrogacy relationships, McCarthy explores how communities negotiate control, intimacy, and trust. In 2014, she also created p5.js, a widely used open-source platform that merges art and education, promoting creative coding with a focus on accessibility and inclusivity. Drawing on her interdisciplinary background, McCarthy frequently integrates AI and computer-based interactions to challenge and reimagine the boundaries of human connection.
In her newest project, she utilizes the environment of a still, driverless vehicle for a ride simulation powered by a responsive audio system. I recently had the chance to talk with McCarthy about the creative process behind Auto (which you can experience at LACMA on Wednesday, July 2) and the questions it raises about human-machine relationships.
Joanne Hong: Could you tell us about Auto in your own words?
Lauren Lee McCarthy: Auto is a performance which takes place in vehicles and navigates the feeling of autopilot—reflecting on our relationship with AI, automation, and surveillance as impending crises loom.
Auto is a new type of driverless vehicle developed in collaboration with the public through a series of test rides. Auto is freedom. Auto is ease. Auto is the feeling of moving at high speed into the future with nobody in the driver’s seat. Auto is out of control.
Passengers enter the vehicle and are asked: where do we want to go? Each ride is different as new features are tested in a play between automation and control. As the trip progresses, the distinction between system and human blurs—the riders become Auto.
JH: You’ve also challenged similar ideas of AI in your previous works like LAUREN and Voice In My Head. In what ways does Auto build upon those works and in what ways does it experiment with new ideas?
LLM: I'm really interested in the ways that we relate to one another, or to each other as a community or society. AI and technology are not the central focus, but they are changing our relationships with each other.
In LAUREN, I perform the role of Alexa, watching and controlling people’s homes as they live in them. I was thinking about how the formative, intimate space of the home becomes surveilled and automated through technology that may not share our values. In Voice In My Head, a collaboration with Kyle McDonald where your inner monologue gets replaced by AI, we were examining how AI is now infiltrating our texts, emails, and thoughts on a daily basis, and how this filters into our social relationships.
Now with Auto, I'm thinking about another kind of intimate space—the car. In L.A. we spend so much time in cars, it becomes a social space. I fell in love in a car. It's also a space of transition. What does it mean to give so much control over to the directions on our phones or the driverless vehicle at this moment of transition?
JH: What do you hope people take away from this experience?
LLM: The car is also a place where there's a lot of risk. You're in an enclosed space with other people and you're moving at high speed. How does it feel to trust a human versus a machine? With Tesla or Waymo, our lives are in the hands of opaque algorithms. Compare that to the feeling of being driven by someone else, perhaps your partner or parent or friend. Auto represents an effort to design an autonomous vehicle that is created by the public, that is representative of our values, needs, and desires.
JH: How do you see Auto developing as a project in future iterations?
LLM: The development of Auto is inherently an iterative and collaborative process. Test rides can take place in garages, driveways, parking lots, alleys, in cars, buses, and trains. Auto is everywhere. Auto is us. Each test ride performance is location specific, adapted through work with local collaborators. Each test ride feeds into the next iteration. The eventual aim is to get Auto out on the road. The next iteration will take place in Zürich, Switzerland, in a driverless bus, so it will become a larger group experience. In all of these test rides, we’re reflecting on our relationship to Auto. Is it comforting to surrender to the ease of automation? What does it take to feel autonomy these days?
The Art + Technology Lab is presented by
The Art + Technology Lab is made possible by Snap Inc.
The Lab is part of The Hyundai Project: Art + Technology at LACMA, a joint initiative between Hyundai Motor Company and LACMA exploring the convergence of art and technology since 2015.