EGO

FILE 2024 | Installations
International Electronic Language Festival

The mirror stage in psychology explains how the Ego forms through objectification, where one’s visual appearance comes into conflict with emotional experience, a concept called ‘alienation‘ by psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan. The interactive installation EGO reenacts and reverses this process by distorting the mirror image based on the user’s movements, highlighting the tension between the real and the symbolic, the Ego and the It, subject and object.

Bio

Klaus Obermaier is an interdisciplinary artist, director and composer who creates innovative works in the performing arts, music and installations using new media. Stefano D’Alessio researches social issues induced by the internet and explores how the web and its derivatives influence human behavior and the body. Martina Menegon creates intricate assemblages of physical and virtual elements, exploring the contemporary self and its hybrid corporeality.

Serendiptichord

The result of a cross-disciplinary investigation spanning fashion, technology, music and dance, the Serendiptichord is a wearable musical instrument that invites the user (or movician) to explore a soundscape through touch and movement. This curious device is housed in a bespoke box and viewed as part of a performance. Unpacked and explored on and around the body, the Serendiptichord only reveals its full potential through the intrepid curiosity of its wearer. Adhering to the body like an extended limb, this instrument is best described as choreophonic prosthetic. Referencing the architectural silhouette of a musical instrument and the soft fabrication of fashion and upholstery, it is designed to entice the movician to explore its surface through touch, physical manipulation and expressive movement. Although this acoustic device can be mastered alone, it also holds subtle openings for group interaction.

توماس هيرشهورن
托马斯·赫塞豪恩
תומס הירשהורן
トーマス·ヒルシュホルン
abschlag

Thomas Hirschhorn’s “Abschlag” installation, which occupies the first room on the main floor, offers a lesson in how not to engage with the Russian milieu: the Swiss artist constructed part of a typical Petersburg apartment block out of cardboard inside the full-height space, ripped off its façade, and deposited the refuse at its base, revealing shabby interiors lined with original avant-garde masterpieces (on loan from the nearby Russian Museum) by the likes of Malevich and El Lissitky. The references allude to a politically radical Russian past; the construction debris acts as a metaphor for history. Though Hirschhorn suggests a recovery of the revolutionary communist spirit of the 1920s, he falls prey to a historically revisionist fetish: citing the Russian avant-garde as a generative point for vanguard culture in the West, and offering it as a source for renewed progressivism in Russia. Hirschhorn seems woefully unaware of the Putin government’s branding campaign, one that aims to sell the Russian avant-guard as a nationalist movement in line with the regime’s own values (perhaps he didn’t watch the Sochi opening ceremony). Hirschhorn ultimately proves Zhilayev right — with its political pretenses, “Abschlag” aspires to make a grand gesture against conservatism, but fails because its critique has already been co-opted..
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Reverse Blinking
Imagine that your head is captured inside a photo camera. It is completely dark. Only when the shutter opens en closes, you see the world in a flash. The shutter moves so fast that nothing has time to move. Everything where you point your gaze at, becomes like a photograph. A memory. Something that has been, but isn’t anymore. You see people as frozen figures, whole streets as untouched moments. Life as a sort of dia show. “Reverse Blinking” creates this experience. It is a completely closed helmet with two shutters in front of the eyes. They are controllable by the user. Reverse Blinking works on batteries and can be freely used in or outside the museum. It is best used where there is a lot of movement and people. “Reverse Blinking” is part of a series of art works, through which the artist tries to add video and photographical effects to our natural way of seeing.

Face IT
The interactive installation FACE IT displays and exposes local people in a communicative setting where they are able to interact with faces of themselves or of other participants and at the same time become creative players and the stars of the artwork. This interactive situation not only creates a strong interplay between facial expressions and body movements, it also enhances these expressions and in the very best moments it creates a unique nonverbal language.

克劳斯奥伯迈尔
the concept of … (here and now)

In front of a giant screen, two dancers interact with a cohort of cameras… Their movements are captured by infra-red sensors and projected onto the screen, whereby their bodies become the canvas on which new images take shape. The result is a shifting kaleidoscope of strange, living, quasi-mathematical visual worlds which sometimes seem to be emanating or even escaping from the dancers’ bodies. “Who decides which movement to make: the man or the machine?” Blurring the line between the real and the virtual, Klaus Obermaier loves to subsume his performers’ bodies and physicality in a disconcerting digital universe. With his latest creation, the choreographer/artist has taken a bold new step. He has constructed a system of projectors and infra-red sensor-cameras, trained upon the movements of two dancers. The performers thus find themselves thrown headlong into a living, moving graphical universe: their movements are projected onto the screen, but at the same time their bodies are illuminated by more projected images. This is a true artistic performance, pushing well beyond the frontiers of a standard dance recital, or even a contemporary dance show. A corporeal, temporal performance. A choreography which makes subtle use of its raw materials, deftly combining lights, video, perspectives and the real-time power of bodily movement.

Synapse
Synapse is a 3D-printed helmet which moves and illuminates according to brain activity[…] The main intention of this project is to explore the possibilities of multi-material 3D printing in order to produce a shape-changing structure around the body as a second skin. Additionally, the project seeks to explore direct control of the movement with neural commands from the brain so that we can effectively control the environment around us through our thoughts. The environment therefore becomes an extension of our bodies. This project aims to play with the intimacy of our bodies and the environment to the point that the distinction between them becomes blurred, as both have ‘become’ a single entity. The helmet motion is controlled by the Eletroencephalography (EEG) of the brain. A Neurosky’s EEG chip and Mindflex headset have been modified and redesigned in order to create a seamless blend between technology and design.

Symphonie Cinétique

The exhibition project focuses mainly on the cor­relation and inter­action of three elements: reflection, sound and movement. Symphonie Cinétique narratively inter­relates the three elements, and brings out their inherent, almost mystic harmony. The result of this process is an artistic synthesis, a unique spatial experience. At the premiere, Arnalds performed the Symphonie Cinétique live on piano and tablet. This fascinating interplay between music, light and movement served as a prelude to the exhibition.

马亚花神
sleep levitations
French artist Maia Flore in a cool series entitled “Sleep Elevations”. A very feminine, surreal, sort of romantic artwork. Her subjects are young women being levitated by objects. Flore wishes to emphasize the attraction the girls feel towards their new, boundless surrounding, and the lightness of the reality they are entering into. Their contorted movements is meant to articulate a contrast between physical limitation and the limitlessness of imagination.

HyperveloCity

HyperveloCITY is a fast forward connected cultural organism that grows on top of the subway stations in downtown Los Angeles. The movement time line of the users (pedestrians, students, cars and train) is used as the operational strategies of the buildings framework. Velocities and rhythms are used to generate a new perception of space. The distance of the institutions would generate a wider field of influence in a dense cityscape. The main three volumes are an urban art museum, educational institution and a new convention centre, all separated one kilometer from each other. The various components of HyperveloCITY are connected by way of a the underground train system. The project is structured to emphasize the use and efficiencies of the public transport system and create not-so-often-seen public spaces and realms in densest part of downtown Los Angeles.

Vivisector

o what extent does the quality of movement of the virtual world influence real sequences of human movement? Will the real world of the 21st century assume via nanotechnology attributes of the virtual world? Are there still significant differences between a body that is made of synthetic material and warmed artificially and the deep glow of trillions of living cells? VIVISECTOR is an examination of the different speeds of people/nature and technology/information society and of their acceleration; an experiment to overcome the space-time continuum in the real world. It breaks the linearity of movement and in doing so shows the absurdity of momentum. Based on the video-technological concept of the moving body-projection that made D.A.V.E. an international hit, VIVISECTOR now goes one step further: the exclusive concentration on video light and video projection produces a new stage aesthetic in which light, body, video and acoustic space form an unprecedented unity.

IN
In IN (2003) an actress remains motionless for an hour in a display window filled with water. The distortion to her senses caused by the environment she is in makes her go into a trance. The sounds of her breathing and movement are amplified by microphones.

أوسكار شليمر
奥斯卡·施莱默
אוסקר שלמר
オスカー·シュレンマー
오스카 슐 렘머
Оскар Шлеммер
Triadic Ballet
1-Margarete Hastings, Franz Schömbs, Georg Verden
1970
2-Super 16mm colour film, directed by Helmut Ammann.
Oskar Schlemmer saw the human body as a new artistic medium. He saw ballet and pantomimes as being free from the historical baggage of theater and opera and, therefore, capable of presenting his ideas of choreographed geometry, the man as a dancer, transformed by his costumes, moving in space. He saw the puppet and puppet movement as superior to that of the human, as this emphasized that the average of all art is artificial. This device could be expressed through stylized movements and the abstraction of the human body. Schlemmer saw the modern world being guided by two main currents, the mechanized (man as a machine and body as a mechanism) and the primordial impulse (the depths of creative urgency). He claimed that choreographed geometry offered a synthesis; the Dionysian and emotional origins of dance become rigid and Apollonian in its final form.
3-Bayerisches Junior Ballet München

The abacus
THE ABACUS is probably the first ever 1:1 interactive physical representation of real, functioning deep learning network, represented in the form of a light sculpture. The main purpose of the installation is to materialise and demystify inherently ephemeral nature of artificial neural networks on which our lives are becoming increasingly reliant on. As the part of new permanent exhibition devoted to the Future the installation aims to engage and educate the audience in artistically compelling ways being the manifestation of art and science movement goals.

ROTOЯ
The Rotor is equipped with a four channel speakersystem and a 360° camera. The artists control the speed of it’s rotation which directly influences the projected video-images as well as the sound-characteristics and the perception of the object itself. Acceleration & deceleration become main parameters, which enables the artists to compose an otherworldly piece that seems to follow it’s own logic. A strange communication between audio, video, object and light establishes itself and seduces the audience. There is the hypnotic movement of the sculpture while inevitable auditory and visual feedback is used as a central aesthetic element: The rotating speakers are amplified by static microphones, provoking complex feedback loops and patterns, that trigger psychoacoustic sensations.

Stalking the Trace
Stalking the Trace est une installation VR multi-spectateurs qui se déroule dans une série d’enceintes, renforcées par l’audio, l’éclairage et les projections pour créer une atmosphère immersive sensorielle dans la galerie. Rossin utilise le mouvement du spectateur à travers l’espace comme méthode pour interroger le désir humain de contrôle et d’agence, et la notion de temps avec le sujet humain en son centre.
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Stalking the Trace is a multi viewer VR installation, takes place within a series of enclosures, heightened by audio, lighting and projections to create a sensory immersive atmosphere within the gallery. Rossin utilises the movement of the viewer through the space as a method to interrogate the human desire for control and agency, and the notion of time with the human subject at its centre.
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Stalking the Trace – это многопользовательская VR-инсталляция, действие которой происходит в серии ограждений, усиленных звуком, освещением и проекциями для создания чувственной иммерсивной атмосферы в галерее. Россин использует движение зрителя в пространстве как метод исследования человеческого стремления к контролю и свободе действий, а также понятия времени с человеческим субъектом в его центре.

The coffee cup spring
The monotone repetition of the movement created by the conveyor belt recalls the pace and the landscape of animation or video games. As an extension of the conveyor, several geometric and orthogonal motifs evoking a Tetris composition are slotted together and suggest the shapes of a table, a chair or stairs. The objects are exposed on thin metal structures with fringed ends, and seem to peel off from their construction, as if they were undressing and exchanging skins, depriving themselves of sculptural depth and allowing only the surface to emerge. The technique developed by the artist to produce the sculptures inverts the usual steps of printing: first the pattern is created, then the background to which the fiberglass support is apposed. The pieces are therefore ripped off their mold, revealing their final texture, and the motif on every sculpture seems to remain the same, yet is altered by the shape of the object itself. A series of wall works using this procedure extends from the installation into the gallery space.

比尔•维奥拉
빌 비올라
ביל ויולה
ビル·ヴィオラ
БИЛЛ ВИОЛА
martyrs (earth, air, fire, water)
“As the work opens, four individuals are shown in stasis, a pause from their suffering. Gradually there is movement in each scene as an element of nature begins to disturb their stillness. Flames rain down, winds begin to lash, water cascades, and earth flies up. As the elements rage, each martyr’s resolve remains unchanged. In their most violent assault, the elements represent the darkest hour of the martyr’s passage through death into the light.”

ELECTRIC SKIN

The Electric Skin explores the possibility of creating a wearable that extends the functionality of the skin to sense electromagnetic fields (mostly within the radio spectrum) and translate that information into touch sensation. The wearable consists of two main functional parts: 1) A matrix of omnidirectional antennas that act as sensors and probes and 2) corresponding electrodes that stimulate the skin of the wearer. Through this artificial “skin” or “exoskeleton”, the wearable changes our experience, perception, and understanding of space and movement, and in doing so, our interactions. The project speculates on the possible co-evolution of man and technology and draws attention to the role of environmental influence on our own bodily development and behavior.

Shifting Intimacies
An interactive/media artwork for one person at a time. Each participant enters a large, dark space containing two circles of projected film imagery presented within an immersive sound environment. One image floats upon a disc of white sand and the other on a circle of white dust. Participants’ movements direct and affect the filmic image and spatialised audio experience. Throughout the work a layer of dust (an artificial life form) slowly eats away and infuses itself deep into the imagery and sound. Each person has 10 minutes alone with the work. Their movement through the space continually affects speed, quality, balance and flow within the work. At the end of the experience they are invited to climb a lit platform and cast dust back onto the images below.

Mai Hi Ten Yu
Yamaha artificial intelligence (AI) technology enabled the world-renowned dancer Kaiji Moriyama to control a piano by his movements. The AI adopted in the system can identify a dancer’s movement in real time by analyzing signals from four types of sensors attached to a dancer’s body. This system has an original database that links melody and movements, and, with this database, the AI on the system creates suitable melody data (MIDI) from the dancer’s movements instantly. The system then sends the MIDI data to a Yamaha Disklavier™ player piano, and it is translated into music.

COLLECTIVE JUMPS / COLLECTIVE JUMPS (EXCERPTS)
Projekt von Isabelle Schad und Laurent Goldring
’The group’s body is made out of many. We exercise practices that have the potential to unite instead of individualize. We understand these practices as a relationship to oneself and to one another, as a pathway. These practices are biological ones, cellular ones, energetic ones. We look at freedom in relation to form : to form that is made of and found by an inner process and its rhythms. Rhythm creates the form. Therefore, there is multitude, multiplicity, subjectivity, and variation : variation within repetition. We look at freedom as the essence of happiness. We experience happiness when the flow of movement can be done together and be maintained. We look at freedom that is guaranteed once everyone within a group can find form in a subjective way. Therefore, there is a specific relation to the term equality : Everyone can be equal, once subjectivity in one‘s own respective rhythm is guaranteed within the form.’I.Schad

CARBONIFEROUS table

Carboniferous is a table that cuts through space, definite and strong.Its many layers of black surface together create a shape, a crystallization of a quick movement, crushing, leading the eye towards the future.The honeycomb cardboard, covered with fiber glass and resin is finished off with layers of carbon fiber.The carbon fiber composes and traces the design, the movement into its unique strength.
In Carboniferous you get the feeling that the top surface does not necessarily represent the ideal landing platform.On another perspective the landing surface generates the powerful and matherical base.
Carboniferous is flowing and exploding, like an aggressive wind with a clear direction.As the earth below, coal is extracted into a new form, the result of sediment build-up of plants,
and also the secrecy and conspiracy of the Carbonari, from underground and from the depth of their hiding places,which emerges a few decades later into the tricolore (the three colours of the Italian flag).
Coal, a dense network of plant remains, and Italy, a mix of cultures and different latitudes.Italian amalgam of different origins, Italy particle edges, Italy multiform, Italy tangle of angles,Italy blunt, concave and convex, Italy Alpine wedge, Italy coal.Sediment of a combustion that melted and transfigured particles.

Suaveciclo
File Festival
Vjsuave is Ygor Marotta and Cecilia Soloaga, a new media art duo, based in São Paulo, Brazil. As specialists in animation, moving projection and digital graffiti, they have realesed 4 short films, “Run”, “Homeless”, “La Cena” and “Trip” Their main performances are: “suaveciclo” – a tricycle adapted to project in the streets, live painting and animation with ipad, live audiovisual performance, video mapping and site-specific a/v installations. They want to comunicate love through light. Their performances are poignant, warm, and personal, crafted from hand-drawn and hand-painted media, transformed into digital animation, then projection-mapped in a way that seems to bring São Paulo’s streets alive. Characters dance and run across the urban landscape, with a convincing blend of simulated movement and real moving projection.

Арво Пярт
Fratres
Structurally, Fratres consists of a set of nine chord sequences, separated by a recurring percussion motif (the so-called “refuge”). The chord sequences themselves follow a pattern, and while the progressing chords explore a rich harmonic space, they have been generated by means of a simple formula. Fratres is driven by three main voices. The low and high voice are each restricted to playing notes from the D harmonic minor scale (D, E, F, G, A, Bb, C#); the middle voice is restricted to the notes of the A minor triad (A, C, E). The entire piece is accompanied by drones in A and E, which are primarily heard in the refuge between each sequence.The chords are created by the movement of the three voices: the low voice starts at C#; the high voice starts at E. Both the low and high voices are moved up or down the D harmonic minor scale at the same time, with the direction of the movement depending on the position within the sequence. The middle voice starts at A and plays a different pattern (A, E, E, C, C, C, C, A, A, E, E, C, C, A). The generated chords create harmonic ambiguity, since both C# and C are present, yielding an A major or A minor feel.