Artist and filmmaker Hito Steyerl (b. 1966, Germany) has, for over two decades, been developing a critical reflection on the circulation of images in the digital age, the militarization of technology, and the invisible infrastructures that shape regimes of perception.

In “Mechanical Kurds”, Steyerl combines documentary research, fiction, and critical speculation, exploring the invisible chains of microwork, the geopolitics of the image, and the mechanisms of delegation at work in “autonomous” technologies. By reactivating the historical figure of the Turk—the 18th-century chess system that concealed a human operator—and transposing it into the era of digital platforms, the artist reveals the bodies, territories, and conflicts obscured by the contemporary fabrication of Artificial Intelligence.