|
PARASITE VISIONS:
INTRODUCTION In previous actions the body has performed
with technology attached (the Third Hand- actuated with EMG
signals), technolology inserted (the Stomach Sculpture- a
self-illuminating, sound-emitting, opening/closing, extending and
retracting mechanism operating in the stomach cavity) and
Net-connected ( the body becoming accessed and remotely activated
by people in other places). The body has been
augemented, invaded and now becomes a
host- not only for technology, but also for
remote agents. Just as the
Internet provides extensive and interactive
ways of displaying, linking and retrieving information and
images it may now
allow unexpected ways of accessing, interfacing and
uploading the body itself. And instead of seeing the Internet
as a means of fulfilling out-moded metaphysical desires of
disembodiment, it offers on the contrary ,
powerful individual and collective strategies for projecting
body presence and extruding body
awareness. The Internet does not hasten the
disappearance of the body and the dissolution of
the self- rather it generates new collective
physical couplings and a telematic scaling of
subjectivity. What becomes important is not merely the
body's identity, but its connectivity-
not its mobility or location, but its
interface....
1. EXOSKELETON A six-legged, pneumatically powered
walking machine has been constructed for the body.
The locomotor, with either ripple or tripod gait
moves fowards, backwards, sideways and turns
on the spot. It can also squat and lift by splaying or
contracting its legs. The body is positioned on a
turn-table, enabling it to rotate about its axis.
It has an exoskeleton on its upper body
and arms. The left arm is an extended arm
with pneumatic manipulator having 11
degrees-of- freedom. It is human-like in form
but with additional functions. The fingers
open and close , becoming multiple
grippers. There is individual flexion of the
fingers, with thumb and wrist rotation. The body
actuates the walking machine by moving its arms.
Different gestures make different
motions- a translation of limb to leg motions.
The body's arms guide the choreography of the
locomotor's movements and thus compose the
cacophony of pneumatic and mechanical and
sensor modulated sounds....
2. EXTRA EAR Having developed a Third Hand,
consider the possibility of constructing an
extra ear, positioned next to the real ear.
A laser scan was done to create a 3D simulation
of the Extra Ear in place. Although the chosen
position is in front of and beside the right ear, this may
not be the surest and safest place anatomically
to put it. A balloon would be inserted under
the skin and then gradually inflated
over a period of months until a bubble
of stretched skin is formed. The balloon is then
removed and a cartilage ear shape is inserted and
pinned inside the bag of excess skin. A cosmetic surgeon
would then need to cut and sew the skin over the cartilage
structure. Rather than the hardware prosthesis of a
mechanical hand , the Extra Ear would be a
soft augmentation, mimicking the actual ear
in shape and structure, but having different functions.
Imagine an ear that cannot hear but rather can
emit noises. Implanted with a sound chip and a
proximity sensor, the ear would speak to anyone
who would get close to it. Perhaps, the ultimate
aim would be for the Extra Ear to whisper sweet
nothings to the other ear. Or imagine the Extra Ear as
an internet antennae able to amplify
RealAudio sounds to augment the local sounds
heard by the actual ears. The Extra Ear would
be a prosthesis made from its own skin. Why an
ear? An ear is a beautiful and complex structure.
In acupuncture, the ear is the site for the
stimulation of body organs. It not only hears but
is also the organ of balance. To have
an extra ear points tomore than visual and
anatomical excess....
3. SURFACE AND SELF: THE SHEDDING OF SKIN As
surface, skin was once the beginning of the
world and simultaneously the boundary
of the self. But now stretched, pierced and
penetrated by technology, the skin is no longer
the smooth and sensuous surface of a site or
a screen. Skin no longer signifies closure.
The rupture of surface and skin means the
erasure of inner and outer. An artwork has
been inserted inside the body.
The Stomach Sculpture- constructed for the Fifth
Australian Sculpture Triennale in Melbourne, whose
theme was site-specific work- was inserted
40cm into the stomach cavity. Not as a prosthetic
implant but as an aesthetic addition. The body
becomes hollow- not the BWO but rather a
body with art. The body is experienced as hollow with
no meaningful distinctions between public,
private and physiological spaces.
The hollow body becomes a host,
not for a self but simply for a sculpture.
As interface, the skin is obsolete.The significance
of the cyber may well reside in the act
of the body shedding its skin. The clothing
of the body with membranes embedded with
alternate sensory and input/ output
devices creates the possibility of more intimate
and enhanced interactivity. Subjectively, the body
experiences itself as a more extruded
system, rather than an eclosed structure. The self
becomes situated beyond the
skin. It is partly through this extrusion that the
body becomes empty. But this emptiness is not
through a lack but from the
extrusion and extension of its capabilities, its new
sensory antennae and its increasingly
remote functioning....
4. FRACTAL FLESH Consider a body that can
extrude its awareness and action into other bodies
or bits of bodies in other places. An
alternate operational entity that is spatially
distubuted but electronically connected. A
movement that you initiate in Melbourne would be
displaced and manifested in another body in
Rotterdam. A shifting, sliding awareness that is
neither "all-here' in this body nor "all-there" in
those bodies. This is not about a fragmented body
but a multilplicity of bodies and parts of bodies
prompting and remotely guiding each
other. This is not about master-slave control
mechanisms but feedback-loops o f
alternate awareness, agency and of
split physiologies. Imagine one side of your body
being remotely guided whilst the other side
could collaborate with local agency.
You watch a part of your body move but you
have neither initiated it nor are you
contracting your muscles to produce it. Imagine
the consequences and advantages of being
a split body with voltage-in, inducing the
behaviour of a remote agent and voltage-out of
your body to control peripheral devices. This would
be a more complex and interesting body-
not simply a single entity with one
agency but one that would be a host
for a multipicity of remote and alien
agents. Of different physiologies and
in varying locations. Certainly there may
be justification, in some situations and for particular
actions to tele-operate a human arm
rather than a robot manipulater- for if the task
is to be performed in a non-hazardous
location, then it might be an advantage to use
a remote human arm- as it would be attached
to another arm and a mobile, intelligent body.
Consider a task begun by a body in one place,
completed by another body in another
place. Or the transmission and conditioning of
a skill. The body not as a site of inscription
but as a medium for the manifestation of
remote agents. This physically split body may
have one arm gesturing involuntarily (remotely
acutated by an unknown agent), whilst the
other arm is enhanced by an exoskeleton
prosthesis to perform with exquisite skill and
with extreme speed. A body
capable of incorporating movement that
from moment t o moment
would be a pure machinic motion
performed with neither memory
nor desire....
5. STIMBOD What makes this possible is a
touch-screen muscle stimulation system. A method
has been developed that enables the body's
movements to be programmed by touching the
muscle sites on the computer model.
Orange flesh maps the possible stimulation
sites whilst red flesh indicates the
actuated muscle(s). The sequence of motions
can be replayed continuously with its
loop function. As well as choreography
by pressing, it is possible to paste sequences
together from a library of
gesture icons. The system allows stimulation
of the programmed movement for
analysis and evaluation before transmission
to actuate the body. At a lower stimulation
level it is a body prompting system.
At a higher stimulation level it is a body
actuation system . This is not about
remote-control of the body, but rather of
constructing bodies with split physiologies,
operating with multiple agency. Was it
Wittgenstein who asked if in raising your
arm you could remove the intention of
raising it what would remain?
Ordinarily, you would associate intention with
action (except, perhaps in an instinctual motion-
or if you have a pathological condition like
Parkinson's disease). With Stimbod, though,
that intention would be transmitted from
another body elsewhere. There
would be actions without
expectations. A two-way tele-Stimbod system
would create a possessed and possessing
body- a split physiology to collaborate
and perform tasks remotely initated
and locally completed- at the same time
in the one physiology....
6. EXTREME ABSENCE AND THE EXPERIENCE OF THE ALIEN
Such a Stimbod would be hollow body,
a host body for the projection and
performance of remote agents. Glove Anaethesia
and Alien Hand are pathological conditions
in which the patient experiences parts of
their body as not there, as not their own,
as not under their own control- an
absence of physiology on the one hand
and an absence of agency on the other. In a
Stimbod not only would it possess a split
physiology but it would experience
parts of itself as
automated, absent and
alien. The problem would no longer be
possessing a split personality, but rather
a split physicality. In our Platonic, Cartesian
and Freudian pasts these might have been
considered pathological and in our Foucauldian
present we focus on inscription and control
of the body. But in the terrain of cyber
complexity that we now inhabit the
inadequacy and the obsolescence of the
ego-agent driven biological body cannot be more
apparent. A transition from
psycho-body to cybersystem becomes necessary
to function effectively and intuitively in
remote spaces, speeded-up situations
and complex technological terrains. During
a Sexuality and Medicine Seminar in Melbourne,
Sandy Stone asked me what would be the
cyber-sexual implications of the Stimbod system? Not
having thought about it before I tried to explain what
it might be like. If I was in Melbourne and Sandy
was in NY, touching my chest would
prompt her to caress her breast.. Someone observing
her there would see it as an act of self-gratification,
as a masturbatory act. She would know though that her
hand was remotely and perhaps even divinely guided!
Given tactile and force-feedback, I would feel my
touch via another person from another place
as a secondary and additional sensation. Or, by feeling my
chest I can also feel her breast. An intimacy through
interface, an intimacy without proximity.
Remember that Stimbod is not merely a sensation of touch
but an actuation system. Can a body cope with
experiences of extreme absence and
alien action without becoming overcome by
outmoded metaphysical fears and obsessions
of individuality and
free agency?
A Stimbod would thus need to
experience its actuality neither
all-present-in this-body, nor
all-present-in-that-body,
but partly-here and projected-partly-there.
An operational system of spatially distributed but
electronically interfaced clusters of bodies ebbing
and flowing in awareness, augmented by alternate
and alien agency....
7. PING BODY / PROT0-PARASITE In 1995 for
Telepolis, people at the Pompidou Centre (Paris),
the Media Lab (Helsinki) and the Doors of
Perception conference (Amsterdam), were able to
remotely access and actuate this body in Luxembourg,
using the touch-screen interfaced muscle stimulation
system. ISDN Picturetel links allowed the body
to see the face of the
person who was moving it whilst the programmers
could observe their remote choreography. (Although
people thought they were merely activating the body's limbs,
they were inadvertently composing the
sounds that were heard and the images of the body they
were seeing- for the body had sensors,
electrodes and transducers on its legs, arms and
head that triggered sampled body signals and sounds and
that also made the body a video switcher and mixer.
And although people in other places were performing with
the RHS of the body, it could respond by
actuating its Third Hand, voltage-out from
electrodes positioned on its abdominal and LHS leg
muscles. The Split Body then was
manifesting a combination of
involuntary - remotely guided, improvised and
EMG- muscle initiated motor motions). In
Ping Body- an Internet Actuated and Uploaded
Performance, (performed first for Digital Aesthetics in
Sydney, but also for DEAF in Rotterdam in 1996),
instead of the body being prompted by other
bodies in other places, Internet activity itself
choreographs and composes the performance.
Random pinging to over 30 global Internet
domains produce values from
0-2000 milliseconds that are mapped to the deltoid,
biceps, flexors, hamstring, and calf muscles -
0-60 volts initiating involuntary movements.
The movements of the body are amplified, with a midi
interface measuring position, proximity and
bending angle of limbs. Activated by Internet datana
the body is uploaded as info
and images to a Web site to be viewed by other
people elsewhere. The body is telematically
scaled-up, stimulated and stretched by
reverberating signals of an inflated spatial and
electrical system. The usual relationship with the
Internet is flipped- instead of the Internet being
constructed by the input from people, the Internet
constructs the activity of one body. The body
becomes a nexus for Internet activity- its
activity a statistical construct of computer networks.....
8. PARASITE: EVENT FOR INVADED AND INVOLUNTARY BODY
A customized search engine has been
constucted that scans, selects and displays
images to the body- which functions in an
interactive video field. Analyses of the JPEG files
provide data that is mapped to the body
via the muscle stimulation
system. There is optical and
electrical input into the
body. The images that you see
are the images that move you . Consider the
body's vision, augmented and adjusted to a
parallel virtuality which increases in intensity
to compensate for the twilight of the real
world. Imagine the search engine selecting
images of the body off the WWW, constructing
a metabody that in turn moves the
physical body. Representations of the body actuate
the body's physiology.The resulting motion is
mirrored in a VRML space at the performance
site and also uploaded to a
Web site as potential and recursive source images
for body reactivation. RealAudio sound is
inserted into sampled body signals and
sounds generated by pressure,
proximity, flexion and
accelerometer sensors. The body's physicality
provides feedback loops of interactive neurons,
nerve endings, muscles, transducers and
Third Hand mechanism. The system
electronically extends the body's optical and
operational parameters beyond its
cyborg augmentation of its Third Hand and
other peripheral devices. The prosthesis of
the Third Hand is counterpointed by the
prosthesis of the search engine software
code. Plugged-in, the body becomes
a parasite sustained by an extended,
external and virtual nervous system.
Parasite was first performed for Virtual World
Orchestra in Glasgow. It has also been presented
for The Studio for Creative Inquiry, Carnegie Mellon
University at the Wood Street Galleries in
Pittsburgh, Festival Atlantico in Lisbon, NTT- ICC
in Tokyo, Ars Electronica in Linz and
for the Fukui Biennale....
9. MOVATAR- AN INVERSE MOTION CAPTURE SYSTEM
Motion Capture allows a
body to animate a 3D computer-generated
virtual body to perform in
computerspace or cyberspace. This is usually
done by either markers on the body tracked by
cameras, analyzed by a computer and the
motion mapped onto the virtual actor. Or it can
be done using electromagnetic sensors (like
Polhemus or Flock-of-Birds) that indicate
position/ orientation of limbs and head.
Consider though a virtual body or an avatar
that can access a physical body, actuating it to
perform in the real world. If the avatar
is imbued with an artificial intelligence,
becoming increasingly autonomous and
unpredictable, then it would be
an AL (Artificial Life) entity performing
with a human body in physical space.
With an appropriate visual software
interface and muscle stimulation system
this would be possible. The avatar
would become a Movatar. It"s repetoire
of behaviour could be modulated continously
by Ping signals and might evolve
using genetic algorithms. And with
appropriate feedback loops from the real
world it would be able to respond
and perform in more complex
and compelling ways. The Movatar
would be able not only to act , but also
to express its emotions by appropriating
the facial muscles of the its physical body.
As a VRML entity it could be logged-into
from anywhere- to allow your body to be
accessed and acted upon. Or,
from its perspective, the Movatar could perform
anywhere in the real world, at anytime with
as many physical bodies in diverse and
spatially separated locations....
10. PHANTOM BODIES AND COLLECTIVE STRATEGIES
Previously connection and communication with other
bodies on the Internet was only textual, with
an acute absence of physical presence.
This was not the experience
of authentic
evolved absence that results in an
effectively operating body in the real word -
absence of the body on the Internet is an
absence of inadequacy, that is an
inadequacy of appropriate feedback-loops.
As we hard-wire more high-fidelity image,
sound, tactile and force-feedback sensation
between bodies then we begin to
generate powerful phantom presences-
not phantom as in phantasmagorical, but phantom
as in phantom limb sensation. The sensation
of the remote body sucked onto your
skin and nerve endings,
collapsing the psychological and spatial
distance between bodies
on the Net. Just as in the experience
of a Phantom Limb with the amputee,
bodies will generate phantom partners , not
because of a lack, but as extending and
enhancing addition to their physiology. Your
aura will not be your own. It will only be through
the constuction of phantoms
that the equivalent of our evolved absence
will be experienced, as we function
increasingly powerfully and with speed and
intuition (a successful body operates automatically).
Bodies must now perform in techno-terrains
and data-structures beyond the
human-scale where intention and
action collapse into accelerated
responses. Bodies acting without expectation,
producing movements without
memory. Can a body act without
emotion? Must a body continuously affirm its
emotional, social and biological status quo?
Or perhaps what is necessary is
electronic erasure with new intimate,
internalized interfaces to allow for the design
of a body with more adequate inputs
and outputs for performance and awareness
augmented by search engines.
Imagine a body remapped and
reconfigured- not in genetic memory but rather
in electronic circuitry. What of a body
that is intimately interfaced to the WWW- and
that is stirred and startled by
distant whispers and remote promptings
of other bodies in other places. A body that
is informed by spiders knowbots and phantoms....
11. OPERATIONAL INTERNET/ INTELLIGENT SYSTEM
Consider the Internet structured so that it would
scan, select and switch- automatically
interfacing clusters of on-line bodies in
real-time (the size and expertise of the clusters
selected for the task to be performed). Can a
body cope with the multiplicity of agents- a fluid and
flowing awareness that dims and intensifies
as agents are connected and disconnected?
Awareness and agency would be
shifted and shared in an electronic space
of distributed intelligence. The internet becomes
not merely a means of information
transmission, but a mode of transduction- affecting
physical action between bodies. Electronic
space as a realm of action, rather than
information. Imagine a body that is open
and aware, invaded, augmented
and with extended operation. Consider a
body whose awareness is extruded by
surrogate robots in situations and spaces where
no body could go. These machines with
arrays of sensors, manipulaters and hybrid
locomotion would exponentially multiply the
operational possibilities- scaling-up the subtlety,
speed and complexity of human action.
Perhaps what it means to be human
is about not retaining our humanity....
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS- Stelarc is presently a Visiting Fellow at the Studio
For Creative Inquiry at Carnegie Mellon University. He has received a
Fellowship from the Visual Arts/Craft Board, Australia Council.
THE INVOLUNTARY, THE ALIEN & THE AUTOMATED:
ABSTRACT These performances have always been concerned with the
dynamics of body and machine movement and how to choreograph and
counterpoint them. In addition there has been a fascination with
computer animation and motion capture. Alternate interfaces are
necessary to coordinate the physiological, the machinic and the
virtual. We usually associate action with intention. In the virtual,
Internet and robot performances the body has experienced the
involuntary, the alien and automated motion- action without intention
and action initiated remotely. It also experiences the extreme
absence that accompanies the alien and the remote. The body becomes a
more varied and extended system of awareness and operation, a more
complex structure of peripheral and prosthetic and phantom
augmentation. Phantom not as in phantasmagoric, but as in phantom
limb. Phantom effects not the result of any bodily loss but rather
through addition of new circuitry. In this way, the phantom is
another way of speaking of the virtual. Feedback loops of images and
information proliferate. More intimate and varied interfaces for the
body have to be constructed. The precision, power and speed of
technology has been incorporated whilst body movements are translated
into machine motions. Its position/orientation is sensed not only in
the local space that it occupies but also in the electronic space
that it operates. The body experiences more external inputs and uses
internal signals as controls. It is both moved (electrically
stimulated) and moves (using muscle signals to activate its Third
Hand). It becomes a split body- both physiologically and
subjectively. Its left side is remotely prompted, whilst its right
side can collaborate with local awareness. The body as a host for
multiple agencies with the involuntary and the alien experienced not
as pathological but rather as alternate and augmenting. Up until now
the body has had prosthetic attachments and implants, but with the
Movatar proposal, the body itself becomes prosthesis for manifesting
the actions of an intelligent avatar in the real world. The phantom
performs as a physical body. Following is a description of the
technology used in the performances and the choreographic
possibilities....
1. THE THIRD HAND is a human-like manipulator attached to the right
arm as an extra hand. It is made to the dimensions of the real right
hand and has a grasp-release, a pinch-release, and a 290-degree wrist
rotation (CW &CCW). It is controlled by EMG signals from the
abdominal and leg muscles. This allows individual movement of the
three hands. Electrodes positioned on four muscle sites provide the
control signals. By contracting the appropriate muscles you can
activate the desired mechanical hand motion. After many years of use
in performances the artist is able to operate the Third Hand
intuitively and immediately, without effort and not needing to
consciously focus. It is possible not only to complete a full motion,
but also to operate it with incremental precision. It is not capable
though of individual finger movements. The Third Hand is effective as
a visual attachment to the body, sometimes mimicking, sometimes
counter-pointing the movements of the actual hands. Amplifying the
motor sounds enhances these small hand motions. EVENT FOR AMPLIFIED
HANDS, Hosei University, Tokyo 1982; EVENT FOR AMPLIFIED BODY, LASER
EYES AND THIRD HAND, New Music America, Houston 1986 and
INTERFACE/INTERPLAY, Experimenta, Melbourne 1990 were some of the
performances in which the Third Hand featured....
2. THE VIRTUAL ARM was designed as a universal manipulator with
functions not limited by either physiological structure or mechanical
constraints. It is controlled by a pair of Data Gloves (or one
Cyberglove). Flexion and position-orientation sensors allow the
mapping of physical hand movements to the 3D-computer model. But this
was not mere mimicry. With a gesture recognition command language, it
is possible to choreograph the extended capabilities of the Virtual
Arm. There are functions such as continuous wrist and finger
rotation, stretching the fingers and arm and even grafting extra
hands onto the fingers (so that the Virtual Arm becomes a fractal
growing structure able to manipulate smaller and smaller objects in
the virtual task environment). With its double-jointedness, it
becomes an ambidextrous arm, able to flip from right to left
handedness. The artist with his VR headset sees the Virtual Arm as a
3D entity seemingly attached to his body, whilst the audience see the
Virtual Arm as a video image projected on a large screen beside the
hardwired and interfaced body- mixed with images of the body
performing with gestures. GRAFT/ REPLICATE, The Great Australian
Science Show, Melbourne was the first performance with the Virtual
Arm. The Virtual Arm becomes an experience of a phantom limb- not
through some loss but through an electronic augmentation. This
virtual limb becomes another kind of third hand....
3. THE VIRTUAL BODY was a computer generated surrogate body used both
as a wire-frame and with rendered skin that stretched and folded as
it turned and twisted. It was activated by a motion-capture system of
electromagnetic position-orientation sensors. Placing them on the
head, upper and lower back, arms and legs enabled the mapping of
total body motions to the Virtual Body. To make the choreography more
interesting, virtual camera views were mapped to the arm motions. For
example turning the right arm 90 degrees resulted in a 360-degree
rotation of the Virtual Body and the involuntary lifting of the left
arm produced a change from an ants-eye view to a birds-eye view of
the Virtual Body. For ROTATE/ ACTUATE, Obscure, Quebec, the resulting
video projection of the Virtual Body was accompanied by amplified
body signals and sounds and the motor sounds of the Third Hand....
4. INDUSTRIAL ROBOT ARMS The body has performed duets with ABB and
Fanuc 6-degree-freedom arms. The robot is pre-programmed to scan and
rotate around the body. With a tilt sensors attached to arms and
head, lifting the arm or thrusting the head back allows the body to
control the speed and to interrupt and insert sampled sequences of
motions within the robots continuous program. Standing within the
task envelope of the industrial arm is not safe. But what was
important was to counterpoint and compare muscles and machines- the
impulsive, intuitive and flexible movement of the body with the
precision, power and speed of the robot. And with the Third Hand
attached and half the body automated with muscle stimulation, the
distinction was blurred and the situation made more complex. The
robot arms were programmed in three different modes- robot
coordinates, linear coordinates and tool center-point motion. With
robot coordinates the beginning and end points are specified and the
arm finds the best way of moving from A to B. Linear coordinates
requires a point by point specification to make the arm move along an
edge. Tool center-point motion means specifying the end point of the
arm in 3D space- the whole arm then adjusts its shoulder, elbow and
wrist articulation to rotate around this stationary point. It results
in a rather fascinating motion. And with a video camera attached to
the end of the arm, this becomes choreography of video images- from
the point of view of the robot. With the possibility of smooth,
precise and speedy (or imperceptibly slow) scanning- as well as
continuous wrist rotation, a dynamic mix of robot images (within the
artistic surveillance system of fixed cameras positioned above,
beside and below the body and robot). These SPLIT BODY/ SCANNING
ROBOTS were performed between 1992-1995 for such events as the EDGE
BIENNALE, London 1992; BODY IN RUINS, V2, Den Bosch 1993; ACREQ,
NEXUS, Montreal 1994 and the BIENNALE DE LYON, Lyon 1995....
5. INSERTED AND INTERNAL For the FIFTH AUSTRALIAN SCULPTURE
TRIENNALE in Melbourne, 1993 a sculpture was designed for the inside
of the body. The theme of the triennial was site specific works.
Instead of constructing a sculpture for a public space, a sculpture
was constructed for a physiological space- the stomach cavity. This
object had to be of a scale and made of materials that were
biocompatible. It had to be of a capsule structure to be safely
inserted down the esophagus and to be a more interesting object I
wanted it to extend in size once safely inside and to have some
operation. It was necessary to have the assistance of a jeweler and a
microsurgery instrument maker to fabricate the STOMACH SCULPTURE.
This self-illuminating, sound-emitting extending and retracting
capsule was a worm-screw mechanism actuated by a flexidrive cable and
a servomotor with a logic circuit. It was inserted approximately 40cm
into the stomach with a video endoscope tracking and recording the
probe. Here technology invades and functions within the body, not as
a prosthetic replacement for some medical necessity, but through
artistic choice, as an aesthetic adornment. The hollow body becomes a
host, not for a self, but simply for a sculpture- an alien,
electronic object moving, flashing and beeping in a wet and
vulnerable internal environment. The body reclines, pacified to
accept the implant, but a machine mechanism dances within....
6. INVOLUNTARY BODY After a series of performances with the left arm
automated with single channel muscle stimulators, a 6-channel
touch-screen interfaced muscle stimulation system was developed. The
tingling, burning sensation of the stimulation has been described as
producing a cramp-like experience as the muscle contracts. At a lower
voltage level, it is merely a prompting system. At higher voltages,
the limb moves involuntarily. Because the stimulation is delivered
incrementally, over some seconds, the motion appears smooth. For
FRACTAL FLESH, Telepolis, Luxembourg 1985 people at the Pompidou
Center in Paris, The Media Lab in Helsinki and the Doors of
Perception Conference in Amsterdam were able to access the body and
activate it remotely. STIMBOD allows the programming of the body
either by touching the muscles on the computer model or by pasting
together a series of gesture icons. Stimbod is connected to the
6-channel muscle stimulation system sending 0-60 volts to the muscle
sites (deltoids, biceps, flexors, thigh and calf muscles). Video
screens at the different locations allow the artist to see the face
of the person programming him- an intimacy without proximity. Tilt
sensors on the head, arms and legs trigger sampled body signals and
sounds and also make the body the video switcher. The remote
programmers thus not only moved the body, but also inadvertently
composed the sound sequences and the video mixing of images that were
transmitted back. Imagine 2 dancers in different locations wired up
with transmitting and receiving systems. It would be possible for the
two connected dancers to be in control of a half of each other's
bodies. Or for one's arm motions (3 joints, 3 segments) to be mapped
to the other's leg motions (3 joints, 3 segments). Or a finger
movement to be translated to an arm motion (i.e. scaling up a
motion). In PING BODY, Digital Aesthetics, Sydney 1996, instead of
people from other places activating the artist, Internet data moves
the body. By pinging over 40 global sites live during the performance
and measuring the reverberating signals, it was possible to map these
to the body's muscles with the muscle stimulation system. The body
does a data dance; it becomes a barometer of Internet activity. If we
ping China, the signal comes back in only hundreds of milliseconds
(therefore not much Internet activity there), whereas if we ping the
USA, it comes back in thousands of milliseconds. The arms and legs
also have sensors that produce sounds indicative of the position and
velocity of the fingers and limbs. Internet activity composes and
choreographs the performance. PARASITE, Virtual World Orchestra,
Glasgow 1997 was a more sophisticated interface with the Internet. A
customized search engine was constructed to scan the WWW live during
the performance to select and display images to the body through its
video headset. Analyses of the JPEG files provide data that is mapped
to the muscles through the Stimbox. The body is optically stimulated
and electrically activated. The images you see are the images that
move your body. You become sustained by an extended and external
nervous system of search engine software code and Internet structure.
In these performances the body is in effect telematically scaled-up
to perceive, and perform within a global electronic space of
information and images....
7. EXOSKELETON is a 600 kgm pneumatically powered 6-legged walking
machine with a tripod and ripple gait. It can move forwards,
backwards, sideways (left and right), sway, squat, stand-up and turn
(CW & CCW). The body is positioned on a turntable so it can rotate on
its axis. It is somewhat clumsy, crude and powerful machine, but
capable of interesting choreography. The 6 legs have 3 degrees of
freedom each. The walking modes can be selected and activated by arm
gestures. An exoskeleton wraps around the upper torso embedded with
magnetic sensor, which indicate the position of the arms. Small
gestures are magnified into large strides- human arm movements are
transformed into machine leg motions. Human bipedal gait is replaced
by an insect-like traversing of space. The body also is extended with
a large 4-fingered manipulator, which has 9 degrees of freedom.
Compressed air, relay switches mechanical sounds and signals from the
machine and manipulator are acoustically amplified. Choreographing
the movements of the machine composes the sounds. EXOSKELETON has
been performed in Hamburg, Jena, Bochum, Prague, Bolzano and Bern1998
and 1999....
8. EXTENDED ARM is worn over the right arm to extend its length to
primate proportions. It has a manipulator attached at the end of the
hand, which has 11 degrees of freedom. As well as individual finger
flexion and thumb and wrist rotation each finger opens and closes
(becoming grippers in themselves). This enables interesting finger
and hand choreography. The operator selects the sequences of motion
through a switching system that also triggers sound samples that
correspond to the movements and augment the amplification of
compressed air and relay switch clicks. Whilst the right arm is
extended and mechanized, the left arm is automated, involuntarily
moved by muscle stimulation....
9. MOTION PROSTHESIS AND MOVATAR an exoskeleton for the arms is
being constructed that will be in effect a motion prosthesis allowing
4 degrees-of-freedom for each side. This would produce a kind of
jerky, giff-like animation of the arms. Embedded with accelerometer,
proximity and tilt sensors, this will be an intelligent, compliant
servo-mechanism which will allow interaction by the dancer,
interrupting the programmed movements- stopping, starting, altering
the speed and inserting selected sampled sequences. Now imagine that
this exoskeleton is the physical analogue for the muscles of an
intelligent avatar. Attaching the exoskeleton means manifesting the
motions of a virtual entity. Movatar is a project that will be
performed for the first time for CYBERCULTURES in Sydney in August
2000. It is an avatar imbued with an artificial intelligence that
makes it somewhat autonomous and operational. It will be able to
perform in the real world by accessing a physical body. So if someone
wears the device and logs into the avatar it will become a host for
an intelligent virtual entity- a medium through which the motions of
the avatar can be expressed. A phantom possesses a body and performs
in the physical world. And if Movatar is a VRML entity based on a
website then anyone anywhere will be able to log into it. And from
the point of view of the intelligent avatar it would be able to
perform with any body, in any place either- sequentially with one
body at a time or simultaneously with a cluster of bodies spatially
separated, but electronically connected to it. A global choreography
conducted by an external intelligence. What would be interesting
would be a kind dance dialogue by a combination of prompted actions
from the avatar and personal responses by the host body. The
experiences would be at times of a possessed and performing body, a
split body. Not split vertically left and right as in the Internet
performances, but split horizontally at the waist. The pneumatically
actuated exoskeleton motions of the prosthesis able to make the upper
torso of the body perform in precise and powerful ways whilst the
legs can perform with flexibility and freedom. The avatar would be
able to determine what is done with the body's arms, but the host
would be able to choose where and for what duration it could be done.
The issue is not one of who is control of the other but rather of a
more complex, interactive performing system of real and virtual
bodies. Movatar would be best described as an inverse motion capture
system. And since sounds generated by the body would be looped back
into the avatar's program to generate a startle response, Movatar
would have not only limbs but also an ear in the world...
CONCLUSION Moving requires feedback loops of sensory and perceptual
data that coordinates the articulation of the jointed body.
Performing with machine attachments and implants, performing with
manipulators and locomoters augments and extends the body's
capabilities and disrupts its habitual sense of position/ orientation
in the space that it occupies and between points that it navigates.
What sensors, video and computers do is to extend the body's nervous
system into the space it dances in producing intelligent, immersive
and responsive environments. Performing with technology heightens
awareness of the physical body moving in space. It not only
accelerates but also magnifies motion. Moved involuntarily by muscle
stimulation through remote prompting, generates feelings of absence
and of the alien, forcing the body to focus on its own physiology and
re-experience what constitutes self and identity. The mindless and
effortless actions that result from performing involuntarily with
certain parts of the body allow the to focus on different functions.
And using finger gestures to manipulate a virtual arm, or using arm
gestures to actuate robot leg motions necessitates remapping of
functions. The body and its machines do not perform with ambient
sound but rather create and compose the soundscape through their
operation and motion. Amplified body signals and sensor signals allow
sound to be mapped to different functions and physiology of the body
and the mechanism of its machines- not only to indicate but also to
amplify small motions and emphasize larger ones. Confined,
constrained, disrupted and dislocated, the body's position,
proximity, velocity and trajectory become problematic....
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTSThe Stomach Sculpture was constructed by Jason
Patterson in Melbourne with the assistance of a Microsurgery
Instrument Maker. Stimbod was developed with the help of Troy
Innocent at Empire Ridge in Melbourne.The Muscle Stimulation System
circuitry was designed by Bio-Electronics, Logitronics and Rainer
Linz in Melbourne with the box fabricated by Jason Patterson.The Fractal
Flesh, Ping Body and Parasite software were developed by Gary Zebington and
Dmitri Aronov in Sydney and the Merlin group assisted with co-ordination.
Exoskeleton was sponsored by SMC Pneumatics and coordinated by Eva Diegritz as
a co-production of Kampnagel, Stelarc, F18 and Diekmann Enterprises. Jason
Patterson fabricated the Extended Arm. Gary Zebington, Rainer Linz and Damien
Everett are currently working on the Movatar project. Steve Middleton in Melbourne
did the computer modeling and simulations for Exoskeleton and The Motion
Prosthesis.
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES Stelarc is an Australian artist who has performed
extensively in Japan, Europe and the USA- including new music, dance
festivals and experimental theatre. He has used medical instruments,
prosthetics, robotics, Virtual Reality systems and the Internet to
explore alternate, intimate and involuntary interfaces with the body.
He has performed with a THIRD HAND, a VIRTUAL ARM, a VIRTUAL BODY and
a STOMACH SCULPTURE. He has acoustically and visually probed the
body- having amplified brainwaves, bloodflow and muscle signals and
filmed the inside of his lungs, stomach and colon, approximately two
meters of internal space. He has done twenty-five body SUSPENSIONS
with insertions into the skin, in different positions and varying
situations in remote locations. For FRACTAL FLESH, as part of
Telepolis, he developed a touch-screen interfaced Muscle
Stimulation System, enabling remote access, actuation and
choreography of the body. Performances such as PING BODY and PARASITE
probe notions of telematic scaling and the engineering of external,
extended and virtual nervous systems for the body using the Internet.
Recently for Kampnagel, he completed EXOSKELETON- a pneumatically
powered 6-legged walking machine actuated by arm gestures. Current
projects include the EXTRA EAR- a surgically constructed ear as an
additional facial feature. Coupled with a modem and a wearable
computer will act as an internet antenna, able to hear RealAudio
sounds and MOVATAR- an intelligent avatar that will be able to
perform in the real world by possessing a physical body. It will have
a sound feedback loop from the body giving the virtual entity an ear
in the world. He is also working on an EXTENDED ARM- a manipulator
with eleven degrees-of-freedom that extends his arm to primate
proportions and a MOTION PROSTHESIS- an intelligent, compliant
servo-mechanism that enables the performance of precise, repetitive
and accelerated prompting or programming of the arms in real-time. In
1995 Stelarc received a three-year Fellowship from The Visual Arts/
Craft Board, The Australia Council. In 1997 he was appointed Honorary
Professor of Art and Robotics at Carnegie Mellon University. In 1998
he was Artist-In-Residence for Hamburg City. In 1999 he was
re-appointed as a Senior Research Scholar for the Faculty of Art and
Design at the Nottingham Trent University. His art is represented by
the Sherman Galleries in Sydney.
|