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Themesicon: navigation pathAesthetics of the Digitalicon: navigation pathEndo-Aesthetics
 
Osmose (Davies, Charlotte), 1995Telematic Dreaming (Sermon, Paul), 1992Telematic Vision (Sermon, Paul), 1993
 
 
 

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of manipulation implying the use of the hands or physical movements, however, but over natural processes of the body: eye movement and breathing. The interaction with the system is conducted over the observer’s selfperception, over the self-controlled activity of the eyes and respiratory system. This enables the interactor to more closely identify with the system, and conveys the impression of taking part ‹in natural fashion› in the virtual world. «Perceptual Arena» or other works using implicit (non-conventional) interfaces, such as «Osmose[23] an immersive and interactive VR installation by Char Davies (1995), translate the special qualities of endo-aesthetics into artist practice. At the same time they are paradigmatic of a kind of intuitively generated interactivity that allows participation in a work without the need for previous knowledge or skills on the part of the audience. Paul Sermon examines the possibilities of non-verbal communication both between interactor and work as well as between various, spatially remote interactors in a series of works such as «Telematic Dreaming» (1992), «Telematic Vision» and «Telematic Séance» (both 1993). Sermon uses telepresence to

 

integrate the real observer as part of the virtual system he observes and with which he internally interacts. Over the network the interactors physically located at different places come together as telepresent inhabitants of the same virtual space, which is visible over the monitor. As soon as the clear separation between telepresent and real, physical bodies blurs, the audience becomes a ‹voyeur› of its own actions, since the interactor now (virtually) exists in and between the two places. In this kind of telematically simulated world people become simultaneously internal and external observers.

The possibilities emerging with digital technologies and their applications in the field of art are inevitably transforming not just the materials, forms, and structures of works of media art, and of interactive art especially, but also revolutionizing the basis of their expressive modes, concepts, and fields of research. Endo-aesthetics must be viewed as a theoretic model conveying from an interdisciplinary position basic concepts for understanding and analyzing this transformation and those contemporary productions exploring the creative possibilities offered by the new

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