notions of a Cyborg

“According to Haraway, cyborgs break with the tradition of a creation controlled and dominated by humans, a creation that refers to a genealogy of creators and creatures and in which neither the boundaries between humans and animals or between humans and machines, nor those between subjects and objects are clearly defined.” Verena Kuni «Cyborg configurations as formations of (self-) creation in the fantasy space of technological creation (I): Old and new mythologies of ‹artificial humans›» http://www.mediaartnet.org/themes/cyborg_bodies/mythical_bodies_I/

The work aims to engage the audience in an experiential time-based interaction focused on the ethereal boundaries situating the physical, electronic and virtual interplay of space and time.

The work integrates performance-based and technological elements. The gesture-based performative element, performed by the artist, integrates a light sensor and circuit board attached to his wrist and finger. A web cam and microphone are also used in conjunction with the light sensor to trigger visual and auditory elements of the work.

The physicality of the work is defined by it sculptural display incorporating several wood boxes (varying sizes), a mirror and screens, which are meant to play off the dimensionality of space. This allows for the focal point of the work to shift continuously for the audience and further enables the performer to integrate himself transparently within the work, thus enhancing for the discrepancy of identifiable boundaries.

The work, could be understood as a time machine. The performer is situated between two planes, the wall and a large streched sheet of mylar behind him (which does not appear in the above documentation). Projections triggered by the artist through the sensors, Max/MSP Jitter software and a laptop are being projected onto the wall and reference the Present. A mirror attached to this first plane mirrors back to the opposite side onto the large streched sheet of mylar, images which are distorted and abstracted, referencing the future. Furthermore a TV monitor (the electronic plane) is situated just below the first plane, enclosed in a box alluding to the past.