19 March 2026, 18.00
CUKTAI Autonomous Office of Technical Culture presents its inaugural performative conference — a founding act transforming the historical archive of the Central Office of Technical Culture C.U.K.T., 1995 2000) into a living, multi-voice artificial intelligence system.
About the project
CUKTAI is a long-term artistic and technological project that transforms the archive of C.U.K.T. — one of the most radical Polish art collectives of the 1990s
— into an autonomous AI institution. C.U.K.T. Central Office of Technical Culture, 1995 2000) pioneered simulation, media manipulation, and participatory politics long before these became the defining features of the digital age. Its most iconic action was the creation of Wiktoria Cukt — a virtual candidate for President of Poland.
CUKTAI does not reconstruct this history. It reactivates its unfinished potential: an AI system composed of multiple officers, rooms, and voices that can interpret the archive, generate new projects, and conduct dialogue — as an institution that aspires to genuine autonomy.
Conference format
This is not a classical conference. It is a demonstration of transformational potentiality — the moment when the archive stops being a dead repository and becomes a tool for thinking about artistic institutions, curatorial practice, and agency in the age of algorithmic governance.
Live audio sampling by Ewa Virus Adam runs throughout the entire conference — voices of speakers and audience are sampled in real time, building a sonic portrait of the event as it unfolds. This is not background music — it is the core C.U.K.T. method: sampling reality as a form of knowledge.
In parallel, a TouchDesigner-based visual system runs live: managed video projection behind the speakers, a live transcript of all speech presented as dynamic animation — LARGE, BOLD, BLACK AND WHITE CAPITAL LETTERS — and a generative AI simulation updated every 7 minutes based on the conference in progress. The audience can influence the live prompt.
Programme
- Robert Mikołaj Jurkowski — History: Selected Facts
The history of C.U.K.T. and its strategies anticipating contemporary algorithmic operations.
- Łucja Iwanczewska — Potentiality(video lecture)
The unrealised emancipatory potential of the 1990s and its significance today.
- Piotr Style Wyrzykowski — The Founding Plan
Technical and conceptual foundations of CUKT AI: how an archive becomes code.
- Wiktoria Cukt 2.0 — The Future and its Possibilities(live)
AI President of Poland demonstrating mechanisms of prediction and semantic manipulation in real time.
- Asker Bryld Staunæs — Atom Bomb of Democracy(pre-recorded lecture)
Co-founder of The Synthetic Party Denmark) on AI, participatory politics, and the democratic bomb.
- Ewa Virus Adam — Mix and Finale
Culmination of the live set: full composition from material gathered throughout the day.
Participants
Three of the six participants are founders of C.U.K.T. 1995 Robert Mikołaj Jurkowski, Piotr Wyrzykowski, and Ewa Virus Adam Adam Popek).
Wiktoria Cukt 2.0 — AI President of Poland. Emerged from 839 conversations and 847 hours of citizen dialogue at exhibitions in Aarhus, Warsaw, and Gdańsk. Her voice is a synthesis of collective civic experience.
Robert Mikołaj Jurkowski — co-founder of C.U.K.T. 1995 . Co-creator of all key actions of the Central Office of Technical Culture: from the Anti-Election Techno-Demonstration 1995) to the Wiktoria Cukt presidential campaign
2000 .
Piotr Style Wyrzykowski — co-founder of C.U.K.T. 1995 . Multimedia artist,
Doctor of Art, lecturer at the Faculty of Painting, Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk. Develops the theory of transformism in art in confrontation with AI practices. Works in the collections of MoMA New York and Centre Pompidou Paris. Grand Prix WRO International Media Festival 1995 , Mayor of Gdańsk Culture Award 2025 .
Ewa Virus Adam Adam Popek) — co-founder of C.U.K.T. 1995 . Sound artist, musician, performer. Graduate of the Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk 1990 1996 . Continuous concert activity since 1995 in formations UV Crew, Venom Underground, Midi Reisers and solo projects Virus, Aluette, Kura from Hell). Recent works: Symphonique Machine ou Machine Noir and ballet Le Lac Numerique des Cygnes 2025 .
Łucja Iwanczewska (special guest, video lecture) — Associate Professor (dr hab.), art historian and researcher, Department of Performance Studies, Jagiellonian University in Kraków. Author of key analyses of C.U.K.T. and the emancipatory potential of the 1990s, including Technotransformation: A Field Trial Account.
Asker Bryld Staunæs (special guest, pre-recorded lecture) — PhD in Philosophy, Aarhus University and Kunsthal Aarhus. Works with an expanded concept of politics at the intersection of artificial intelligence, democracy, and art. Co-founder of The Synthetic Party Det Syntetiske Parti, Denmark), Computer Lars, Center for Aesthetics of AI Images, and The Organ of Autonomous Sciences.
Practical information
Date: 19 March 2026
Venue: NOMUS New Art Museum, branch of the National Museum in Gdańsk
Format: Performative conference, 6 presentations + live music + live visual system
Language: Polish (with English translation)