From 2005 until 2013, Benjamin Gaulon ran e-wastes and refunct media workshops, building individual and collective installations, all around the world. In recent years, these have culminated into what he calls Tech Mining, workshops that combine e-waste, defunct media and material extractions as a resource for art making, a medium to create zombies or to repurpose old into new products.

More recently, Benjamin was invited to run a Tech Mining workshop at HEAD in Geneva, a week long workshop that would take students on a journey of understanding the potential of defunct media and hardware. As they collected their parts from the local flea market, they were asked to consider 3 possible outcomes:

• Experimental: Hacking / Glitching / circuit bending (ReFunct Media)
• Applied: Repurposing / upcycling / permacomputing (Internet of Dead Things)
• Material: Plastic / Minerals extracting (Core Samples)

Students speculated around genres such as Cyberpunk to Solarpunk, looking at how plants and wildlife will emerge from the hashes and e-waste of the anthropocene in a post-capitalist world. They explored themes such as Care, Repair and Maintenance, looking at researchers such as Nicolas Nova, Yves Citton, Alexandre Monnin, Bernard Steigler and more. Benjamin’s workshops always combine theory and practice, with a series of presentations and talks. Students worked in groups to produce work that was sometimes experimental, sculptural or, using a Critical Maker and Permacomputing approaches –– re-imagining and speculating on new tools and services from obsolete media and hardware.

Tech Mining (HEAD) Workshop Results:

Broken Vision – Lise Mendes & Tara Hächler

This project repurposes non-functional electronic objects within the scenography—transforming them into de- cor, reflections, shadows and sounds. The performance is driven by analog projections, blending live visuals and recovered sounds into a rhythmic composition.

The camera is at the heart of the installation—both as a central object and as the medium itself. We gathered 13cameras: some functional, others not. The working ones are actively filming, each offering a unique perspective, texture, and visual signature. The result is a layered performance where everything is orchestrated by the came- ras, with the cameras, and through the cameras.

Lise Mendes (@lise_mndes) | Tara Hächler (@tara.hachler)

Liquid Crystal Drifter – Antonin Ricou

This installation is an experimental and audiovisual project, repurposing discarded electronics to explore the intersection of light, liquid, and digital feedback loops. The project employs an AxiDraw plotter to manipulate liquid beneath an LCD screen, generating organic pressure waves that distort light patterns. A mounted webcam captures this interplay and projects it back onto the LCD, creating a continuous visual feedback loop.

This closed system transforms mechanical motion into evolving visual distortions, reminiscent of liquid refraction, organic warping, and real-time light modulation. Beyond this physical loop, a web-based interface introduces digital processing, applying shader-based refraction, distortion, and generative overlays to further manipulate the captured video stream. By bridging analog materiality with digital augmentation, Liquid Light Feedback challenges the boundaries between physical motion and computational processing, demonstrating the creative potential of recycled technology in media art.

Antonin Ricou (@antonin.ricou)

Passe-moi le sek – Chakir Ali, Ayoub Azzouzi & Bruno Da Cruz Costa

“Passe-moi le sel !” is a sound-driven performance enhanced by visual elements displayed on an old TV. It explores the hidden voices of materials, revealing their sonic identities. At its core, a turntable’s needle becomes an instrument of discovery, “reading” discarded motherboards and circuit boards to uncover their unique melodies. The journey culminates with a 3D-printed disc covered in salt, symbolizing the raw materials from which these electronic components originate. By amplifying the voices of these forgotten elements, the performance breathes new life into obsolete technology, transforming them into storytellers of their own past.

A discarded turntable is repurposed to explore sounds beyond traditional vinyl playback. As the needle traverses different materials, it generates unexpected audio textures. The performance features a series of custom-made discs crafted from old circuit boards, leading up to a final 3D-printed disc covered in salt, representing the raw origins of electronic components. In real time, the artist manipulates these sounds using a soundboard, enhancing the experience and giving a voice to forgotten materials.

Chakir Ali (@grisastre) | Ayoub Azzouzi (@big______time) |  Bruno Da Cruz Costa (@brunoal_costa)

Precisa Virtuosa – Haneul Farmanfarmaian & Karina Wolff

Precisa virtuosa is created from a discarded Precisa calculator and a broken radio, two obsolete machines reimagined into a single hybrid body. Originally built for precise calculations, the calculator no longer wishes to function as intended. Instead, it performs. Each press of a number key triggers am- plified typewriter sounds and a mechanical tone, unique to each digit. As more inputs accumulate, the machine grows overwhelmed, and the faint signal of a radio voice emerges, disrupting the pattern.

This project explores the emotional potential of machines and questions the roles they are assigned. It imagines a world where obsolete devices reclaim their agency and refuse to be reduced to function alone. Haneul and Karina’s motivation was to transform e-waste into a poetic medium, a machine that sings instead of calculates.

Haneul Farmanfarmaian (@merci.bien ) | Karina Wolff (@karinamw_)

Flower Meadow 3049 – Elisa Bernard & Polina Fihman

In 3049, the meadows we once admired exist only in memories. The flowers that bloomed every spring have become part of history, frozen in digital archives. On the artificial meadow, 18 fans rotate, symbolizing flowers. As the blades spin, the name of a rare, vanishing plant appears. But these are not just words — the shape and color that emerge before our eyes replicate the real appearance of these flowers while they still exist in nature.

This project reflects on a future where nature becomes a memory, and technology is the only way to preserve its images. Will these flowers be part of our world in 3049, or will only their names and digital archives remain?

Elisa Bernard (@elisabernaard) & Polina Fihman (@polinafihman)

Sound of Trash – Peter Ha & Liuliu Zhu

Sound of Trash is an interactive audio-visual installation that transforms electronic waste into musical instruments. Using materials such as discarded circuit boards, speakers from old radios, earpieces from broken headphones, and even organic conductive materials like banana and orange peels, Peter and Liuliu created a playful capacitive sensor wall powered by Arduino. These elements produce sound when touched, turning e-waste into an experimental instrument.

The audio is transformed from field recordings of e-waste components, capturing the unique analog sounds they produce. These recordings were processed in Max MSP, where user interactions trigger and manipulate them in real time. The intensity of touch influences sound parameters such as pitch and duration, allowing users to compose new music from discarded materials. A projection layer enhances the experience, visualizing the user\’92s fingertip movements and the generated sounds. This infinitely expandable installation also allows users to rearrange connections to explore the sonic potential of electronic devices, or collaborate to form an e-waste orchestra, and creatively engage with e-waste.

Peter Ha (@hiddenenigma) | Liuliu Zhu (@liuliu_66_z)

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Benjamin tells us that there is a playful aspect to his workshops. He wants students to play with these devices, get inspired by making them. So a palpable joy is usually present, sometimes unsolicited smoke or accident may occur, but mostly it’s safe and students are warned in advance. Over the years, Benjamin has noticed a change where some students never used analog video or audio signal, or for example a CRT screen. It gives him an opportunity to explain the evolution from analog to digital and show the students the potential of analog––the physically of it, how we can “touch” a signal, bend it, glitch it, in ways we can’t do with HDMI or digital tech in general. Students see the potential of using these devices (that are still working and are very affordable) today, for projects, whether they are experimental or trying to be more practical. This is ever so more evident with students that do a lot of screen based work, and they tend to really enjoy the physicality of tech and making things manually.

Benjamin is scheduled to do a workshop in les Arts Déco in Paris next academic year. This summer, workshops will run as a part of his unique NØ SCHOOL NEVERS international summer school, held in Nevers, in Burgundy. He has also explored these themes with Engineering students at  Centrale Supelec and Sciences So where he has been teaching for a few years now.

For more information about Benjamin’s workshops and to learn about his art practice, see links below.

Benjamin Gaulon | Recyclism | HEAD