Pictures in Your Mind: Using Interactive Gesture-Controlled Reliefs to Explore Art

Tactile reliefs offer many benefits over the more classic raised line drawings or tactile diagrams, as depth, 3D shape, and surface textures are directly perceivable. Although often created for blind and visually impaired (BVI) people, a wider range of people may benefit from such multimodal material. However, some reliefs are still difficult to understand without proper guidance or accompanying verbal descriptions, hindering autonomous exploration. In this work, we present a gesture-controlled interactive audio guide (IAG) based on recent low-cost depth cameras that can be operated directly with the hands on relief surfaces during tactile exploration. The interactively explorable, location-dependent verbal and captioned descriptions promise rapid tactile accessibility to 2.5D spatial information in a home or education setting, to online resources, or as a kiosk installation at public places. We present a working prototype, discuss design decisions, and present the results of two evaluation studies: the first with 13 BVI test users and the second follow-up study with 14 test users across a wide range of people with differences and difficulties associated with perception, memory, cognition, and communication. The participant-led research method of this latter study prompted new, significant and innovative developments

Visuality and the haptic qualities of the line in generative art

The line has an important and particular relationship with the generative artwork distinct from other elements such as the ‘pixel’, ‘voxel’ or the ‘points’ that make up point clouds. The line has a dual nature as both continuous and discrete which makes it perhaps uniquely placed to straddle the analog and digital worlds. It has a haptic or felt quality as well as an inherent ambiguity that promotes a relatively active interpretive role for the audience. There is an extensive history of the line in generative systems and artworks, taking both analog and digital forms. That it continues to play an important role, alongside other more photographically inspired ‘perceptual schemas’, may be a testament to its enduring usefulness and unique character. This paper considers the particular affordances and the ‘visuality’ of the line in relation to generative artworks. This includes asking how we might account for the felt quality of lines and the socially and culturally constructed aspects that shape our relationship with them. It asks whether, in what has been described as a ‘post digital’ or even ‘post post digital’ world, the line may offer a way to re-emphasise a more human scale and a materiality that can push back, gently, against other more dominant perceptual schemas. It also asks what generative art can learn from drawing theory, many of the concerns of which parallel and intersect with those of generative art

Toile

Toile is a painting series that explores constructions of taste and the semiotics of manufactured fabrics. Through the use of irony, paradox and deconstructions of rhythm, shape, color and form, the paintings are a response to the formal and historical content in the fabric. The idyllic landscape, notions of identity, sexism and liminality are some of the themes considered in the series. The paintings in this exhibition attempt to correct and mediate outdated models of representation through the exploration of painting as a process that is open and malleable

Likovni umjetnički doživljaj slijepe osobe

In the art educational process, we have met a blind student. That encouraged us to try to investigate how a blind person experiences a pictorial work of art. The framework of the research covered an examination of experiencing a pictorial work of art (its duration, intensity and individual art expression) for a congenitally blind person by applying an educational approach that was designed to enhance her experience of art work. The subject, the only blind student in the regular third grade gymnasium curriculum of visual art, participated in the research. The measuring tool consisted of five selected and adapted paintings of V. van Gogh, and changes in the time needed for tactile art experience were measured as well as art expression and tactile self assessment, in which the subject determined the intensity of experiencing the selected art work during multiple experiencing. The analysis of quantitative changes was carried out using the statistical method of individual differences. The results of the research have shown that the application of the abovementioned approach influenced the time of experience and art expression of the experienced work of art for the subject. The significance of previous experience was confirmed, based on knowing and recognising the content of the adapted tactile picture. Therefore, after multiple experiences, the time needed for the perception and art expression of experienced content became shorter. However, at the same time, the intensity of the selected works of art remained mainly unchanged. The remarkable intrinsic motivation of the subject was noticeable, leading to positive transfer towards the art educator. That certainly had a positive impact on the experience of pictorial works of art.U nastavi likovne umjetnosti susreli smo se sa slijepom učenicom. To nas je potaklo da pokušamo istražiti kako slijepa osoba doživljava slikarsko djelo. Okosnica istraživanja obuhvaćala je ispitivanje doživljaja slikarskog djela (njegovo trajanje, intenzitet i osobnu likovnu ekspresiju) kod osobe slijepe od rođenja primjenom osmišljenog edukativnog pristupa koji joj je trebao pomoći da unaprijedi svoj doživljaj likovnog djela. U istraživanju je sudjelovala jedna ispitanica, učenica koja je jedina bila uključena u redovni nastavni program likovne umjetnosti u trećem razredu gimnazije. Mjerni instrument sastojao se od pet odabranih i prilagođenih slika Vincenta van Gogha, mjerenja promjena u vremenu potrebnom za taktilni doživljaj likovnog djela kao i njegovu likovnu ekspresiju te taktilne samoprocjene kojom je ispitanica određivala intenzitet doživljaja pojedinog likovnog djela pri višestrukom doživljavanju. Analiza kvantitativnih promjena provedena je primjenom statističke metode Individualne Diferencije (INDIF). Rezultati istraživanja potvrdili su da je primjena navedenog pristupa utjecala na vrijeme doživljavanja i likovnog izražavanja doživljenog likovnog djela kod ispitanice. Potvrđen je značaj prethodnog iskustva, utemeljenog na poznavanju i prepoznavanju sadržaja prilagođene taktilne slike. Zbog toga se vrijeme potrebno za percipiranje i likovno izražavanje doživljenog smanjilo, nakon višestrukog doživljavanja. Pri tome je intenzitet doživljaja odabranih likovnih djela uglavnom ostao nepromijenjen. Zamjetna je i velika intrinzična motivacija ispitanice te pozitivan transfer prema likovnom edukatoru, što je zasigurno imalo pozitivan utjecaj na doživljavanje slikarskih djela

Likovni umjetnički doživljaj slijepe osobe

In the art educational process, we have met a blind student. That encouraged us to try to investigate how a blind person experiences a pictorial work of art. The framework of the research covered an examination of experiencing a pictorial work of art (its duration, intensity and individual art expression) for a congenitally blind person by applying an educational approach that was designed to enhance her experience of art work. The subject, the only blind student in the regular third grade gymnasium curriculum of visual art, participated in the research. The measuring tool consisted of five selected and adapted paintings of V. van Gogh, and changes in the time needed for tactile art experience were measured as well as art expression and tactile self assessment, in which the subject determined the intensity of experiencing the selected art work during multiple experiencing. The analysis of quantitative changes was carried out using the statistical method of individual differences. The results of the research have shown that the application of the abovementioned approach influenced the time of experience and art expression of the experienced work of art for the subject. The significance of previous experience was confirmed, based on knowing and recognising the content of the adapted tactile picture. Therefore, after multiple experiences, the time needed for the perception and art expression of experienced content became shorter. However, at the same time, the intensity of the selected works of art remained mainly unchanged. The remarkable intrinsic motivation of the subject was noticeable, leading to positive transfer towards the art educator. That certainly had a positive impact on the experience of pictorial works of art.U nastavi likovne umjetnosti susreli smo se sa slijepom učenicom. To nas je potaklo da pokušamo istražiti kako slijepa osoba doživljava slikarsko djelo. Okosnica istraživanja obuhvaćala je ispitivanje doživljaja slikarskog djela (njegovo trajanje, intenzitet i osobnu likovnu ekspresiju) kod osobe slijepe od rođenja primjenom osmišljenog edukativnog pristupa koji joj je trebao pomoći da unaprijedi svoj doživljaj likovnog djela. U istraživanju je sudjelovala jedna ispitanica, učenica koja je jedina bila uključena u redovni nastavni program likovne umjetnosti u trećem razredu gimnazije. Mjerni instrument sastojao se od pet odabranih i prilagođenih slika Vincenta van Gogha, mjerenja promjena u vremenu potrebnom za taktilni doživljaj likovnog djela kao i njegovu likovnu ekspresiju te taktilne samoprocjene kojom je ispitanica određivala intenzitet doživljaja pojedinog likovnog djela pri višestrukom doživljavanju. Analiza kvantitativnih promjena provedena je primjenom statističke metode Individualne Diferencije (INDIF). Rezultati istraživanja potvrdili su da je primjena navedenog pristupa utjecala na vrijeme doživljavanja i likovnog izražavanja doživljenog likovnog djela kod ispitanice. Potvrđen je značaj prethodnog iskustva, utemeljenog na poznavanju i prepoznavanju sadržaja prilagođene taktilne slike. Zbog toga se vrijeme potrebno za percipiranje i likovno izražavanje doživljenog smanjilo, nakon višestrukog doživljavanja. Pri tome je intenzitet doživljaja odabranih likovnih djela uglavnom ostao nepromijenjen. Zamjetna je i velika intrinzična motivacija ispitanice te pozitivan transfer prema likovnom edukatoru, što je zasigurno imalo pozitivan utjecaj na doživljavanje slikarskih djela

Virtual reality: Theoretical basis, practical applications

Virtual reality (VR) is a powerful multimedia visualization technique offering a range of mechanisms by which many new experiences can be made available. This paper deals with the basic nature of VR, the technologies needed to create it, and its potential, especially for helping disabled people. It also offers an overview of some examples of existing VR systems

Material, Trace, Trauma: Notes on some Recent Acquisitions at the Canadian War Museum and the Legacy of the First World War

Recent acquisitions at the Canadian War Museum are considered in relation to the radical innovations of soldier-artists who endured the somatic conditions of the First World War trenches, privileging materiality and psychic reality over visual perception. Barbara Steinman and Norman Takeuchi bring the past into the present through the indexical presence of black and white photographic fragments and the emotive presentation of lost objects as signifiers of the desires of the absent. Scott Waters and Mary Kavanagh evoke dread and the contingency of death through anamorphic distortion and blinding luminosity. Like the suggestive surfaces of the Museum itself, these works unsettle us to make palpable the psychic toll of war