It’s All Over: a screening and conversation between artists Miljohn Ruperto and Daniel R. Small
Join Minnesota Street Project Foundation and the Cantor Arts Center for a special one-night screening of Daniel R. Small’s “Techne: Evidence in the Anthropocene” (2022), followed by a conversation between artists and collaborators Miljohn Ruperto and Daniel R. Small.
Drawing on the themes of the film, the conversation will delve into speculative futures, the possibilities of artistic thinking, generative knowledge systems, and archiving records of human existence and achievement.
📅 Friday, March 20
🕒 7-9pm
📍Exhibition Warehouse, 1201 Minnesota Street, San Francisco
FREE and open to the public
This program is presented in conjunction with the exhibitions, “Miljohn Ruperto: Ultimate Days,” on view at Minnesota Street Project Foundation, March 14 - April 18, 2026, and “Animal, Vegetable, nor Mineral: Works by Miljohn Ruperto,” on view at the Cantor Arts Center, March 12 - September 14, 2026.
Link in bio to learn more ⬆️
🎥Daniel R. Small, Techne: Evidence in the Anthropocene (2022), video still. Courtesy of the artist.
Lucien Ever Small, born October 29th, 2025. He arrived unannounced and not without difficulty, but Erica and I are undone by him in the best possible way. We couldn’t be more in love with him and all of his tiny, improbable affectations. Before the delivery, the nurses sat me in a hallway chair facing a still from Dumbo: the moment when he clings to the feather he thinks lets him fly. I don’t know if every partner at Providence Hospital ends up staring at that same image, or if it was just the seat they needed me to fill while the world started rearranging itself. It was all a humbling lesson in the acceptance of uncertainty and the slow unclenching of the mind’s fist around all the outcomes you tried to predict. Something about how the future doesn’t arrive as a finished shape; but as a shifting outline you learn to inhabit. For all the many more lessons in this and so many others to come we are so thrilled to bring this baby into the world. He is also pretty darn cute.
If you’re in Cambridge, MA this coming Monday April 8th and out watching the eclipse come over to MIT‘s Bartos Theater at 6pm for an east coast screening of Techne: Evidence in the Anthropocene. The screening is hosted by the Art, Culture, and Technology (ACT) program. After the screening, I’ll be in conversation with Azra Aksamija, Director of ACT.
Techne: Evidence in the Anthropocene telescopes between galactic and planetary evidence that is presented by scientists and artist-investigators who contemplate both deep time and the fate of the human species. Using the framework of a simulation model developed at NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory that considers the probability for intelligent life to occur in the Milky Way galaxy, as well as the potential for self-annihilation; new forms and methods of investigation are highlighted. By moving back and forth between dystopian landscapes, forgotten technologies, legal conditions, and forensic traces a web of interconnected realities emerges through seemingly disparate sets of ideas and research methods. Evidence in the Anthropocene is about an era that is marked by a crisis of imagination and travels with these scientists and artists to explore the lush landscape of a remote Indonesian palm oil plantation; the abandoned ruins of a former nuclear test site in the Bikini Atoll lagoon that now appears as a sub-natural alien megastructure; the concept of the “material witness” in the context of the legal imagination; and gestures towards colonizing other planets and the “cone of imaginable possibilities” by developing weaving prototypes in zero gravity.
Huge thanks to @azraaksamija@actmit@lacma@amedina.co for making this event possible
Wat Pariwat Ratchasongkram
Erica and I recently visited Wat Pariwat, an almost unvisited temple in south Bangkok. It consists of stucco sculptures on the exterior depicting gods, demons, mythological creatures both ancient and contemporary, cowboys, vikings, samurai, Greek mythological figures, local animal deities, Dragon Ball, Pikachu, Superman, Pinocchio, Popeye, David Beckham, and countless others that encase the interior of a Golden Buddha that is backlit by neon lights changing colors at a regular interval. The lights appear to flicker or strobe from the entrance looking in. All of this is not put into service as some kitsch monument to worship the unmooring of history, but as a leveling platform intermixing all deities and histories into uniquely blended pastiches where every symbol develops a relation to every other. It is a strange cathartic release from modernist mythologies, and felt more like an artwork than anything I've seen recently. The temple was erected in the early 18th century as a Royal temple but was renovated by artist Surin Panumat to delineate a new era. It is the last 100+ years of art history embodied in a single site.
Erica and I conquered fate long ago, but got married a few weeks ago to solidify what we already knew was true! I couldn’t be any happier, luckier, or more in love with you @ericablumenthal ❤️🌺👰♀️
There are a few more seats left for the premiere of Techne: Evidence in the Anthropocene at Caltech's Beckman Auditorium this Thursday August 17th from 7-9pm. Please RSVP at link in bio to reserve your seats.
Evidence in the Anthropocene is about an era that is marked by a crisis of imagination and travels with scientists and artists to explore the lush landscape of a remote Indonesian palm oil plantation; the abandoned ruins of a former nuclear test site in the Bikini Atoll lagoon that now appears as a sub-natural alien megastructure; the concept of the “material witness” in the context of the legal imagination; and gestures towards colonizing other planets and the “cone of imaginable possibilities” by developing weaving prototypes in zero gravity.
Techne has been a real labor of love and I want to thank the artists, scientists, crew, and especially Fernando Sanchez, Joel Ferree and LACMA for helping make this project possible.
Also, a huge thanks to Jonathan H Jiang, Kristen Fahy, Julian Charrière, Ebru Kurbak, and Susan Schuppli who are featured in the film as well as the panel featuring the amazing and inimitable Ann Druyan, the Creative Director of the Golden Record, and moderator Daniel Oberhaus, the author of Extraterrestrial Languages, and Michael Alexander from Caltech.
Music by: Jefre Cantu-Ledesma, Félicia Atkinson and Stephen O’ Malley, Stephen O’ Malley, Aaron Lepley
Looking forward to seeing everyone Thursday!
@coconutsoldier@ferreejoel@lacma@maddaluv@jonathanhjiang@julian.charriere@ebru.kurbak@anndruyan@d__oberhau@stephenomalley74@jcantuledesma@felicia_atkinson@aaron_lepley_music
Los Angeles---the premiere screening of my film Techne: Evidence in the Anthropocene is happening in a few weeks. Techne was developed in association with the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). I'm thrilled we were able to make this premiere event possible at the historic Beckman Auditorium at Caltech so please join on August 17th from 7-9pm. Please RSVP using the link in my bio if you wish to attend.
Techne telescopes between galactic and planetary evidence presented by scientists and artist-investigators who contemplate both deep time and the fate of the human species. The film brings together scientists from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (which Caltech manages for NASA), Jonathan H. Jiang, and Kristen Fahy, as well as artists Julian Charrière, Susan Schuppli, and Ebru Kurbak.
Following the 48-minute screening, stay for a panel discussion and announcement about a new interstellar messaging effort to revise the Golden Record. The panel will include Jonathan H. Jiang, Ann Druyan (Creative Director and collaborator with Carl Sagan, her husband, on the Golden Record), and Techne director Daniel R. Small. The discussion will be moderated by Daniel Oberhaus, science and technology journalist and author of Extraterrestrial Languages (2019).
@lacma@caltechedu@jonathanhjiang@anndruyan@d__oberhau@coconutsoldier@julian.charriere@ebru.kurbak
I’m giving a keynote at Seoul National University today. If you happen to be here come by and say hi. I’ll be talking about protocinema in the caves of El Castillo, the Deep CCZ expedition, Techne an episodic documentary series, and another documentary project with NASA involving the revision of the Voyager Golden Record. Thanks to @jihoinim and Seoul National University for the invitation.
