Doomscrolling Live

Systm’s inaugural Doomscrolling event took place at 242hz in bourgerhout, Antwerp.

In this event systm presented an experimental DJ - VJ format, mixing music and memes. The format allowed for the visuals to be manipulated in real-time, rendering them into a kind of memetic clay. This goes for the sound as well, as the setup allowed blending between the CDJs and the memes.

With these affordances the performers could recreate the psychic conditions of doomscrolling for a live audicence - a pacifying solo nighttime ritual made communal.

Each performer was asked to exploit their own algorithm and curate their memes and music into a cohesive blend. Throughout this process of show and tell, much was illuminated regarding how expansive perception is on our digital ecosystems. And from a curatorial perspective, each performer had a choice of how they would recontextualize their meme diet. Some leaned into the logic of doomscrolling and brainrot, while others fought against it. Future doomscrolling events will be conducted to go deeper into the stranger psychic corners our algorithms produce .