Rediscovering The Interpersonal: Models Of Networked Communication In New Media Performance

This paper examines the themes of human perception and participation within the contemporary paradigm and relates the hallmarks of the major paradigm shift which occurred in the mid-20th century from a structural view of the world to a systems view. In this context, the author’s creative practice is described, outlining a methodology for working with the communication networks and interpersonal feedback loops that help to define our relationships to each other and to media since that paradigm shift. This research is framed within a larger field of inquiry into the impact of contemporary New Media Art as we experience it. This thesis proposes generative/cybernetic/systems art as the most appropriate media to model the processes of cultural identity production and networked communication. It reviews brief definitions of the systems paradigm and some key principles of cybernetic theory, with emphasis on generative, indeterminate processes. These definitions provide context for a brief review of precedents for the use of these models in the arts, (especially in process art, experimental video, interactive art, algorithmic composition, and sound art) since the mid-20th century, in direct correlation to the paradigm shift into systems thinking. Research outcomes reported here describe a recent body of generative art performances that have evolved from this intermedial, research-based creative practice, and discuss its use of algorithms, electronic media, and performance to provide audiences with access to an intuitive model of the interpersonal in a networked world

Brains, Selves and Spirituality in the History of Cybernetics

Paper presented at the Templeton Workshop, ‘Transhumanism and the Meanings of Progress,’ Arizona State University, 24-25 April 200

Potential Energy and the Body Electric

Physics tells us that potential energy is the capacity to do work that a body possesses as a result of its position in electric, magnetic, or gravitational fields. Thinking of “potentiality” in an electric idiom and with reference to its place in human biological processes that implicate electric phenomena, such as the pulses of action potentials that animate the heart and brain, can afford novel angles into contemporary biomedical enactments of humanness. This paper explores the material and rhetorical power of electric potential in cardiac and neurological medicine, paying attention to how discourses of “waves” of energy format the way scientists apprehend bodies as emplaced in time—in a time that can be about both cyclicity and futurity. Attention to electrophysiological phenomena may enrich the way anthropologists of the biosciences think about potentiality, taking scholars beyond our established attentions to the genetic, cellular, or pharmacological to think about the body electric

Brain Waves, A Cultural History: Oscillations of Neuroscience, Technology, Telepathy, and Transcendence

This project proceeds from a narrow question: What, if anything, is a brain wave? Beguiling in its simplicity, this question prompts a cultural-historical investigation that spans over 150 years of science, technology, and society. Proposed in 1869, the original theory of brain waves cites etheric undulations to explain reports of apparent thought transference. Though most modern thinkers no longer believe in outright telepathy, I argue that dreams of thought transmission and other mental miracles subtly persist—not in obscure and occult circles, but at the forefront of technoscience. A hybrid of science and fiction, brain waves represent an ideal subject through which to explore the ways in which technical language shrouds spiritual dreams. Today, the phrase “brain waves” often function as shorthand for electrical changes in the brain, particularly in the context of technologies that purport to “read” some aspect of mental function, or to transmit neural data to a digital device. While such technologies appear uniquely modern, the history of brain waves reveals that they are merely the millennial incarnation of a much older hope—a hope for transmission and transcendence via the brain’s emanations

Situated Aesthetics: Interaction and Participation in Biofeedback Performances

This practice-based PhD explores how the implementation of biofeedback in audio-visual performances can challenge the traditional divisions between the roles of the artist, the audience and the artwork. This was achieved by designing a system to accommodate these performances and iterating the system across three performances. At the centre of the system is the use of biometric devices to collect real-time data from audience participants. Their brainwaves and heart rates were interfaced with audio-visual outputs which were made both visible and audible to them, thereby influencing the original data and creating a biofeedback loop. The first of the four experiments took place in a controlled studio environment without an audience and served to establish which technologies were most suited to this end. The technologies were tested for their prospective reliability and accessibility in a live performance environment, with the ultimate aim of enabling the greatest level of interaction between the roles of artist, audience and artwork. The following three experiments took place between 2015-18 and were funded by commissioning bodies to be hosted in galleries and exhibition spaces with an audience present. Each of these latter three performances continued to iterate the system’s design, implementing changes in response to the obstacles and opportunities presented at each stage of the process. The research question took as its starting point the principles of practice as research and the fields of social practice and cybernetics. Broadly defined, social practice is a field of art whose theory and practice foregrounds participation and an awareness of context and process in the production of artworks. Cybernetics is a field of science and philosophy which studies how systems self-regulate within, and adapt to, their environments through mechanisms of feedback and circularity, exploring principles of situatedness, embodiment, interaction and control. By drawing on the respective theories and practices of these fields, this thesis will document how they each informed the experiments in addressing the research question. Little research exists on the points of contact between social practice and cybernetics. Considered together, they mutually inform one another and present a number of illuminating points of departure when considering the embedded hierarchies and relationships between the roles of artist, audience and artwork

BIOFEEDBACK AND YOGA

Early in their exploring the new field of biofeedback, Elmer and Alyce Green developed a strategy ofstudying individuals with unusual abilities in psychophysiologic self-regulation. This strategy provided a usefol way ofdetermining possibilities and limits in the new field. In the selection below, "Biofeedback and Yoga, "from The Five Minute Hour, published by Geigy Pharmaceuticals, Ardsley, New York, in 1914, Elmer Green details how this specialized area of studies developed, and what was learned from investigations with an Indian yogi, Swami Rama. rEds.

Cognitive-Neural Effects of Brush Writing of Chinese Characters: Cortical Excitation of Theta Rhythm

Chinese calligraphy has been scientifically investigated within the contexts and principles of psychology, cognitive science, and the cognitive neuroscience. On the basis of vast amount of research in the last 30 years, we have developed a cybernetic theory of handwriting and calligraphy to account for the intricate interactions of several psychological dimensions involved in the dynamic act of graphic production. Central to this system of writing are the role of sensory, bio-, cognitive, and neurofeedback mechanisms for the initiation, guidance, and regulation of the writing motions vis-a-vis visual-geometric variations of Chinese characters. This experiment provided the first evidence of cortical excitation in EEG theta wave as a neural hub that integrates information coming from changes in the practitioner’s body, emotions, and cognition. In addition, it has also confirmed neurofeedback as an essential component of the cybernetic theory of handwriting and calligraphy