Technoetic Arts - Volume 15, Issue 2, 2017

Art has always been a transgressive way of exploring in-between and liminal aspects of human experience. Within the current era of social upheaval and crisis, it is of great interest how extreme emotions can be aestheticized and examined under new interdisciplinary lenses. Anger has constituted an excluded emotion – often a taboo within rationalized social norms – although the politics of repression in various threads of contemporary life are often a provoking factor. Yet, it has always been an emotion with not only great expressive qualities but also located near wisdom, virtue and wrath. Can anger be spatialized through intermedia practices? How can the aesthetization of such an emotion reveal political aspects of such works of art? The current article seeks to explore the potential and aesthetics of anger in contemporary art and in particular how it becomes performed, spatialized and mediatized with poetic and political implications. Having as the starting platform the philosophical, cultural and socio-spatial aspects of emotions within wider contemporary affective structures of the everyday, it explores such an emotion through different trajectories (philosophical, cultural, spatial) and forms of artistic expression, ranging from video art and installation to hybrid performances and documented walking actions. Therefore, the article focuses on a number of artists including the works of Bill Viola, Pipilotti Rist, Claire Fontaine, Lanfranco Aceti, Regina Galindo and Bill Psarras.

Oskar Schlemmer was an artist and choreographer associated with the German Bauhaus Art School, he was well known for his dance of trinity called the Das Triadische Ballett (The Triadic Ballet). In his 1925 essay, he underlined that the progressive mechanisation of the life trough machine and technology was a more than a trend, but something that we cannot ignore. Nowadays, as a century ago, the alliance human (intelligent) machine is still at the centre of the debate for researchers as well as for practitioners in arts and design fields; all are in a perpetual search of ‘Gesamtkunstwerk’ and/or ‘Gesamtdatenwerk’, as ‘integrated data work’ a term coined by the British artist Roy Ascott (Ascott [1989] 1989). In 2016, Mafalda Millies and Rosa Sachs, in partner with Performa Visionaries, brought Virtual There to the 1922 Schlemmer show. Likewise, the Bartlett School of Architecture (London) has recently opened a Master’s in design for performance and interaction; it seems to be a contemporary version of the 1936 Design-Correlation Laboratory established by the Architect Frederick Kiesler at Columbia University. Early in his career, Kiesler (1926), together with Norina Machabelli and Dr Bes Mesendieck, initiated the Brooklyn International Theatre Art Institute. The author of this article is currently working as lecturer in Thailand in a product design education curriculum. Joi Ito, MIT MediaLab Director in an interview with Robert Buderi, stated that new design is ‘computational design, biological design, systems design’ (2015). while this concept makes perfect sense from a global-scale view, we might have to consider that design is quite a young academic discipline in certain emerging markets, such as South East Asia. Design studies, and particularly product and industrial design, are based on ‘human factors’: ergonomics and human-centred approaches, in relation to the human-machine (artefacts). Here is one of the challenges: while the human body is the locus of such studies, the role and the meaning of the body in Thailand is quite different compared to Western conceptions. As a Theravada-based Buddhist country, and a ‘no-tactile society’ (Lewis 1996: 472), the human body in this society is the subject of several traditional rules that span from greeting to the way of seating. Moreover, Confucian influence in the education system is an essential aspect to consider in developing tomorrow’s design class. Based on these conceptions, product design education could be enhanced as a discipline to facilitate a sort of critical thinking by reframing the human body preconceptions thought physical outcomes. The author wrote this article based on his practice and research, highlighting some of the local cultural taboos surrounding the perception of the body and its relation with others. Furthermore, the article will explain the key points of his product design education approach, designed for Thai students. This is a framework where the body has become the locus or ‘self reflection’, and where physical theatre is a way of enhancing self-confidence and facilitating the process of critical thinking.

This article is a result of an interest in the uncanny aspects of symmetry that manifest in artworks that have attained such a state of eeriness through electronic means. This stems from a personal image-processing experiment during which the duplicated and reversed pixels were manipulated into a mirror state that, due to its digital perfection, attained uncanniness. This visual experiment will be discussed against a framework of the connectivity of the symbols principle as it relates to visual art; Wolfgang Pauli’s interest in symmetry as a binder of quantum theory and the collective unconscious; the interplay and dependence between symmetry and asymmetry; and especially Sigmund Freud’s 1919 discourse of ‘The Uncanny’ as an answer for the eeriness of the perfect digital mirror.

Brain imaging and neuroimaging are used both to perceive brain structure and function and to assess any outcome after intervention. Brain imaging and neuroimaging accessed within the scope of art is an innovative scientific field. The experience of brain imaging and neuroimaging of art emerges from the interaction of multiple cognitive processes. The author’s basic objective is to present the way that human brain functions, blended with state-of-the-art techniques, could be translated into an art experience. Moreover, the way brain region networks act is used to produce exceptional and moving art experiences, which are analysed henceforth.

Requiem for a Dream is an engaging three-act narrative presenting a sensorial take on the decaying experience of addiction. Using highly subjective representations of reality tainted by what can be refer to as a drug aesthetics, the second feature film directed by Darren Aronofsky is a four-way first-person account that revolves around Harry, a drifting young man who dreams of being successful, Sara, a widow who dreams of being on television, Marion, a psychotherapy patient who dreams of becoming independent, and Tyrone, an orphan who dreams of making his mother proud. Although there is not one single protagonist, Harry is the pivot figure connecting the four subjects: Sara is his mother, Marion is his girlfriend and Tyrone is his friend and business partner. The film is constructed with short alternating scenes of each character, merging its enunciation with these four individuals’ inner voices to depict how drugs – both prescribed and illegally acquired – affect their consciousness as they fall into addition.

Requiem for a Dream can be placed in a category of drug movies that aim to explore the internal effects of substances as their main subject matter. Instead of dealing with historical or sociological aspects, it explores the highly subjective representations of the world tainted by what can be referred to as the aesthetics of drugs. Deriving from Elsaesser‘s definition of productive pathology (2009: 24–30), this article proposes to explore how audiovisual narratives, in dealing with altered and sensorial states of the mind, can amplify the possibilities of storytelling. In other words, how internally focalized drug movies expand the aesthetics possibilities of realism in film, playing with subversive uses of language while still sustaining a verisimilar discourse.

The analysis will take two paths. First, based on the assumption that there is no objective access to the physical world except through subjectivity, the initial part of this article will present a reflection on the dichotomy of reality and illusion, proposing a new alternative by taking the perceptive alterations caused by drugs as a starting point to convey how social structures and morality play a definitive role in our understanding of realism in art.

Secondly, approaching specifically the idea of drug aesthetics, the article will consider how audiovisual representation is affected when the subjective point of view is of a character with an altered state of mind. Exploring the mechanics used to translate the effects of drugs on consciousness into filmic form, Requiem for a Dream will be studied as an example of applying unorthodox methods of narration to expand an audience’s experience of a subject matter beyond dramatic storytelling and into a sensorial perception of the universe of mental stimulators.

The article ‘Through the gates of Croatia and back: Listening walks in East Slavonia’ provides a deep connection between the artistic and technical sides of acoustic art. Through the acoustic environment of Vinkovci in Croatia, my place of birth, which I left in 1991, I discovered an inner world that has been reflected in my composition. My journey was guided by the concepts of psychogeography and listening walks. It also brought me to the understanding of the fine line between field recording (the material) and soundscape composition (the form). The term ‘soundscape’ pertains to the acoustic envelope we are living in. It implies that the sounds of rooms, places and landscapes can be considered as representative elements and signs. It is the expression of the material, cultural and social consistence of our presence. The soundscape composition deals with the perception of the acoustic environment through sound transformations. To find associations between dreams, memories and experiences is the intention of many soundscape composers. Barry Truax explained these principles very clearly by using a module that contains the psychological, social and physical levels. By listening to samples of the composition in stereo version, the audience will experience the soundscape of Vinkovci through Truax’s module. It will prove the necessity of environmental listening, in order to discover and to understand the acoustic identity defined by R. Murray Schafer and his terms like keynotes, soundsignals, soundmarks, Lo-Fi and Hi-Fi. Another purpose of the article is to discuss how the object-based system changes and opens new possibilities in acoustic composing and design. The aim is to place the sounds in the acoustic space in order to build an individual soundscape, to make the sound tangible and to make the acoustic space an immersive and deconstructive experience for the listener: an artist’s dream over centuries.

Hyper-reality has often been described as the inability of perception to identify and distinguish reality from a simulation of reality. Modern thinkers and scholars such as Umberto Eco and Jean Baudrillard have elaborated extensively on the subject and the effect of simulations within a variety of aspects of modern life. When it comes to auditory arts and research, even though the influence of simulations may be evident, it seems to have been overlooked. With this article, I intend to scrutinize ‘aural simulacra’. During the last two centuries, the audio signal has passed through various stages of transformation; it has mutated following the rhythm of an era marked by technological advancement and a globalized plethora of ideas. For example, the phenomenon of schizophonia has rendered possible the detachment of sounds from their original source and reproducing them within a variety of different contexts. Reproductive media in their turn have evolved from carved discs to magnetic tapes and from optical means to digital abyssal clouds, matrixes of ones and zeroes promoting endless expressive possibilities. In addition, innovative diffusion methods are being introduced and virtual reality technologies have started to populate the scene. Despite the debate on whether the medium may or may not be the message, it adds to it; it acts as a catalyst to an evolutionary reaction. But what happens to the signal itself? Is it transcending to a different dimension of existence?

Treating the signal as a sign, together with practice-based research, may delineate the importance of its conceptual metamorphosis and the ramifications it has for creative processes and the audience’s engagement with the sound artwork. With this article, I intend to examine the sign orders in relation to auditory reality and authenticity, the signal’s change as it may belong to the sacramental order, the order of maleficence, the order of sorcery or find itself outside of the orders of the heard as pure simulacrum. The acknowledgement of the aural simulacrum and the study of the signal’s path towards it may affect our understanding of sonic arts practice, the mediumship of the listener and related areas of research. More specifically subjects such as acoustic ecology, composition but also historical auditory research are scholarly fields that are expected to be influenced, initiating further dialogue, critical analysis and providing the foundation for further interdisciplinary research and new creative processes.

In this article, we investigate the circumstances under which the sound structures, which are products of algorithmic composition, are considered as ‘music’. The methods of analysis and evaluation of the music pieces that have derived from mathematical procedures are still under development. Is their ‘beauty’ hidden in the final outcome of the algorithm or in its conceptual background? What is more important: the creator’s approach or the listener’s perception? The answers we attempt to provide are revealed from the tools of semiotics and memetics. We study whether a sound structure, derivative of an algorithm, can act as a signifier of an aesthetic signified, forming a seme. Moreover, we examine whether that seme can be spread as a meme (a unit of cultural phenomena).

The spread of biotechnology and genetic engineering has led to a new creative thinking in the context of contemporary visual culture where art, science and life evolve into a network of interdependence. Starting from this premise, this article analyses the works of important artists who, from the late 1990s, have modelled genetic material to create artistic works. These transgenic representations become a metaphor for cultural hybridization. They are places of transaction that contradict their documentary size, losing the concept of memory, narration and storage. Artistic objects are replaced by the evanescence of aesthetics, reconsidering the relationship between image and information. This study goes beyond the boundaries of art, attempting to understand the reasons for the crisis of its representation. Focusing attention on transgenic art means to say that the artist as a scientist is not only able to change life, but to reinvent it completely. Attention is also focused on mixtures of the various ontological categories where bodies are connected to machines in an intimate or a hidden way, questioning the idea of nature and the concept of life. This article will attempt to answer the following questions: how has molecular biology influenced the development of contemporary art? Who is the artist today and what are the new areas of enquiry?

The art of living systems is a type of art and science that explores and redefines specialities of living systems using sci-tech. Today, since we are living in anthropocene, nature has become increasingly more complex, and we can influence increasingly more. Artists are always at the edge of transforming processes, contemplating them and trying out what is going to happen soon. Living systems art is an artform where the natural and the technological converge and combine with each other. Julie Freeman’s words provide the right direction to the current article: ‘Technology is at its best when it creates a connection between humans and nature in a stimulating yet gentle way’ (2017). In other words, technology can help us to rethink nature and perceive it differently. This is the first and most important paradigm that I assume. The second focus of my framework, since the field of the art of living systems is quite vast, includes examples of sensual mastery of nature. By living systems I mean animals, plants, insects – the world of flora and fauna, and by sensual mastery of nature I mean a way to pay caring and mindful attention to it, becoming emotionally involved. My third focus is, since art and science is my professional interest, on the artworks where the natural and the technological are merged and intermingled. Finally, I describe five projects, all created by Russian artists, demonstrating some common features of the art of living systems.

In my research, I have used synthetic biology techniques to understand more deeply the implications of biotechnology as a form of art practice – of thinking through making. In doing so, I have become increasingly aware that, whilst synthetic biology makes many promises for the future of humanity, it does so from within a capitalist system that does not fully account for the environmental impact of technological advances. The core of my research resides in artistic practice situated within a UK genetics laboratory, where I develop experience in molecular biology and synthetic biology in order to store a thought physically within the body of the living organism, Escherichia coli (E. coli), deliberately following scientific protocols in order to explore the affect of working with the living organism as medium. Through the creation of a cypher that maps phonemes to codons, I translated a thought (the question, ‘what will happen if I store this thought safe within you?’) into DNA and stored it within E. coli, which I have been growing in the laboratory for over a year, to observe how my intervention has impacted the organisms and affected myself as an artist using biotechnology. I have brought this research to a public audience via an evolving series of exhibitions, Pithos (Mackenzie 2016), Viral Experiments (Mackenzie 2017), Genocentric (Mackenzie 2017) and, more recently, a workshop series titled Transformation (Mackenzie 2017). In the longer term I plan to store the thought within my own cells, not those of a laboratory organism, in a project titled Wishful Thinking or Velleity with(out) Volition, as a post-anthropocentric reflection on the imposition of will inherent in humanity as a species.

Art and Science are usually considered fields of different perceptions and approaches with very little overlap, but when combined, sometimes something unusually beautiful and unexpected can arise. Currently, a major effort is being made to promote the interaction between artists and scientists as demonstrated by some of the most recent grant programmes by organizations such as the United Kingdom’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). Occasionally, artists are approaching science with slightly different insights than those expected, but to date, there is a gap that is rarely violated despite the extraordinary ideas that may arise from such collaborations. There can be no doubt that Nature is the greatest inspiration for art and beauty. In many ways, science attempts to reveal the rules and the beauty of nature. Microscopy, as a technique in scientific research, plays a key role in revealing the beauty of nature, a trend that has led some to regard it as a form of art. But can this claim be justified? For the uninitiated, microscopy could provide a high-resolution image of nature’s creations, revealing at the same time its inherent beauty. The cells – human or non-human – form images of the same beauty as those represented in paintings. Preparations observed under the microscope contain a wealth of information. The aim of the researcher is to correlate the cellular structure with the functioning of the organism and ultimately with the miracle of life. The aesthetic quality of the images has led many scientists to stand in their artistic nature. But can we say that microscopy, which is essentially a way of acquiring and analyzing scientific data, is a form of art? If art is the creation of works by people of extraordinary talent, then microscopy might be an art form and a technique that seeks the functional disclosure of complex admirers of cellular structures. However, unlike music or painting, microscopy is certainly not a form of art, with the traditional concept of creativity. The question therefore arises as to whether the aesthetic nature of the images revealed by a microscope can be considered as art. This is a question that is the starting point of this article.

Bio artworks tend towards social reflection, conveying political and societal criticism through the combination of artistic and scientific processes. Some bio artworks also challenge to subvert hegemonic political imaginaries. In this article, focusing on the curation of a bio artwork and making an ethnographic research based on my participatory observation, I suggest a new conception of contemporary curatorial practice, ‘paratactical curation’, which aims to create performative political imaginaries and alternative futures. The article focuses on The Invisible Life, a series of a bio artwork of Joseph A. DeGiorgis and Ayse Gul Suter. This series was exhibited in Contemporary Istanbul Art Fair – Plugin New Media Section that I have curated in 2015. The main discussion is developed by paying attention to the giant squid axon work, in which the article responds to the emergence of a new political realm that reflects the communication problems of post-control societies: connection failures, memory loss and noise.

This article presents a mixed-media installation titled Ekphrasis, consisting of close-up videos of a heavily scarred body projected onto an elastic screen. The screen has one string attached to its centre, which in turn is attached to a stepper motor. The motor pulls the screen in a controlled random pattern, stretching it and letting go, sometimes carefully, sometimes violently. The piece explores the relationship between the digital representation of the body and its corporeity, recreating the trauma that generated the scars on the medium itself, and proposing a new layer of abstraction that sustains the reflection on the significance of the human body.

Man perceives three dimensions but this does not necessarily exclude the existence of higher spatial dimensions, also known as ‘hyperspace’. Higher dimensions have been and still are the object of study and source of inspiration for many artists and scientists. Many efforts have been made to perceive hyperspace through vision. The audio ‘visualization’ of hyperspace may result in a better outcome, perhaps due to similarities between sound and hyperspatial gravitational waves, or even because the corresponding audio centres in our brain are better suited for perceiving hyperspace. Focusing on Varèse, we proceed to a concise historical retrospective of the efforts to approach fourth dimension through music. The interaction between artists and the world of science, and the intuition that forms an integral part of art, have both been a decisive source of inspiration. Furthermore, we describe the characteristics of hyperspatial sound based on scientific discoveries. Finally, we present a logical approach to the hyperspatial audio system based on these characteristics and describe an interactive installation art on acoustic hyperspace.