CITAR launches the 4th volume of The Science and Technology of the Arts Collection, a collaboration between CITAR and UCP Press. This scientific book series follows two of the research centre’s main lines of inquiry — Cinema & Visual Arts and Sound & New Media Art — engaging with the scientific production emerging from the major events organised by the research unit.

This fourth volume, The New Sentient and Spectrums, is edited by José Alberto Gomes, José Vasco Carvalho and Lorena Ferreira Alves, bringing together contributions by Bernardo Bento, Esteban Agosin Otero, Jéssica Pereira Gaspar, Juan Carlos Duarte Regino, Leonor Reis, Mariana Machado, Ryszard W. Kluszczyński and Zhiqiang Li.

Seeking to expand on some of the key themes of the Explorations on Sound and New Media Art Conference: New Sentient and Spectrums, the book emerges from a line of inquiry that intertwines artistic practice and theoretical reflection to examine the transformation of the sentient in contemporary conditions, bringing together perspectives from art, technology, ecology and posthuman thought. In a context marked by the increasing convergence of the human, the technological and the natural, the volume frames art as a speculative space for resistance, experimentation and the creation of new imaginaries and modes of existence.

Structured around two main axes — Speculative Practices and Immersive Studies in Sound, Media and Cinema — the volume gathers research and projects on experimental artistic practices related to ecology, emerging technologies, sound, cinema, installation and immersive experiences. Topics addressed include the relationship between natural and artificial systems, soundscapes, electromagnetic signals, expanded consciousness, artificial intelligence, sensory experience and sociopolitical questions linked to contemporary digital culture.

The New Sentient and Spectrums is now available for free access through the UCP Press Open Books platform.