Specialist Project Evaluative Report:

For this unit, I set out to provide the preparatory planning, structuring, prototyping and initial experimentation toward creating an interactive installation focusing on human rights violation. Throughout the unit the idea development for the project has been fairly extensive due to the many different aspects of pre-production that have been covered. Each stage of this pre-production have had their own conceptual, contextual and general issues, but each were overcome in different ways, teaching me huge amounts about the necessary requirements and scale of a project such as this.

I knew from the beginning of the unit that I wanted to create a human rights installation piece, but as a way to initially develop on this idea I researched a selection of contextual examples from other artists, all of which represented a human rights cause. The work of these artists gave me inspiration to develop my idea into a more structured format, leading me to then write an initial proposal to develop on throughout the unit. Initially, I used these proposals as a means of obtaining feedback about the project, but as I refined the ideas and structure of the piece the amended proposals became a way of promoting the piece to potential collaborators and as a tool for promoting the piece.

One of the most important aspects of this unit and the project in general was the human rights and case study research, as this was hugely necessary in finding examples of unjust incarceration and the political contexts behind them.

An aspect of the stage that I did not anticipate however was how much my research within this area would alter the idea development and direction of the piece. Overall it proved massively beneficial in helping me structure the themes, context and narratives of the project and was hugely informative regarding human rights around the world. The decision to represent three political prisoners in three separate countries primarily spawned from extensive research into these case studies and the human rights of their countries, and I feel this was a very positive development of the format of the piece, informing the design of the floor and layout plans and making it more conceptually accessible to potential audiences.

However, the research stage of this unit was not without issues. It was a very long process finding each case study and their background information and political context for example, one which was only managed through many hours of research via human rights organisations and informative articles.

Additionally, deciding which case studies to represent was a very difficult choice, as all had valid reasons why representation would be warranted. Choosing which to represent involved a large amount of discussion and consideration into how it could benefit the project, and in turn be the most effective way of representing the causes. Eventually, despite the case studies I chose potentially not being the most appalling example of human rights denial, I felt tying the three case studies together with a similar cause (that of political imprisonment through being a human rights activist) would be the most effective, resulting in me choosing Iran; Nasrin Sotoudeh, China; Gao Zhisheng and Burma; Zaw Zaw Aung. I intend to continue building my research on these three case studies through continual correspondence with human rights organisations and more of my own extensive research, as if I am to develop a piece around each I will have to obtain more relevant information and audio/visual content.

Another important part of this unit was the experience-based tests I conducted in order to gain a good idea of people’s emotive responses to elements of interactivity, experience and audio/visual content. I felt it very necessary to emulate and represent the themes and potential aspects I planned to represent in the piece, as I needed to know whether they would be effective means of portraying the injustices of the case studies I plan to represent. I felt the most effective means of doing this would be to set up these experience installations, involve a set of willing audience members and ask them a series of questions, documenting their response.

The set up involved constructing three separate experience based tests (one primarily visual and two primarily audio based) in the back room of my house, giving me good practise in installation and audiovisual set up, especially in a space fairly representative of the one I intend for the final piece.

Overall, the findings from these tests were some of the most insightful from all the work during this unit. So much so that I felt the only viable way to discuss my findings and conclusions was to record a piece to camera describing them.

However, these tests did bring about some issues, one being that not all the emotive responses and the conclusions I gained from the tests were ones that I initially anticipated. With the second test for example, my initial assumption was that combination of reading a passage of text and hearing the corresponding monologue would enhance the emotive response, but after conduction the test I realised that almost the opposite was true, leaving me to have to question whether to include or modify that interactive experience within the piece. All in all however, these responses, despite being adverse to my assumptions, can be still be noted as positive and helpful findings, as all demonstrate how audiences would respond to the final piece.

I will continue to carry out tests similar to this one throughout the EMP however, as they were incredibly insightful in terms of gauging audience response to different experiences.

Another large aspect of this unit was the attempt of gaining collaborators to help work on the many different areas of the project, due to it being of a fairly large scale. I managed to gain a selection of collaborators throughout the unit, focusing on aspects of art direction, curation, event management, technical design and construction based roles, and have also gained interest amongst the Digital Media Production second years for taking on aspects of the technical design roles for their Professional Project unit, for which I will be presenting to them on December 4^th.

However, one prevalent issue I faced with this aspect of the unit, was the realisation that finding collaboration was throughout the University was much more difficult than I anticipated. Despite contacting course leaders, course Facebook pages and specific people; I got very little overall response. This hindered progression of certain aspects of the project such as the technical design and development, as I intended to progress through this stage with a collaborator. Thusly, the technical tests were not as extensive as I had planned.

Nonetheless, to combat this issue I broadened my search; promoting the piece through methods not focused within the university. Fortunately, this gained the project some initial collaborators.

Overall, despite not quite being in the position I intended to be in at the end of this unit, I am relatively happy with my position regarding collaboration, as an initial team has been constructed and there is the strong potential of further collaborators in the near future.

During this unit I found theoretical research incredibly helpful in the understanding the concept of interactive installations and the creation of empathy within them. Researching contextual reading from interactive artists like Don Ritter and psychology reports on the subject of empathy and it’s workings in the context of the third person proved beneficial for the conceptual development of the project, as I intend to utilise these aspects in my own project.

The only issue I faced during this stage however, was finding reading material specifically relevant to the creation of empathy in human rights installation art. However, in order to get past this, I focused on reading based around alternate mediums of empathy creation and applied the concepts to my own work, as the information could be translated to interactive installation relatively simply.

Something that I had initially intended on endeavoring to do early in the unit, was contacting relevant human rights organisations regarding information about case studies and to potentially obtain any audiovisual media thereof. However, the development of the project helped me realise that this contact should be made further into the piece’s progress, as it would prove far more beneficial contacting organisations with a strong idea of the themes, case studies and concepts I intended to employ. For example, I came to the realisation that I should concrete my three case studies before contacting human rights organisations for information or media, as contacting prior to this may have seemed uninformed and therefore I may not gain the desired information I required.

So overall I believe my decision of leaving the organisation contact and correspondence until later in the unit was a valuable decision, allowing the project to gain conceptual stability prior.

In conclusion, I am fairly happy with the overall work of the unit. The interactive tests and case study research proved massively fundamental in the idea and project development and vastly helpful in understanding audience relationship and understanding of a piece such as this, whereas some of the logistical aspects, such as the collaboration and technical tests proved slightly more difficult and therefore less constructive or extensive.

But overall I feel the work and findings of this unit have been very helpful in the progression and development of the project and have prepared me for continuing the project towards exhibition in the EMP.

Contextual Research on Interactive Installation and Third Person Empathy:

Throughout this unit and through my dissertation research I have found an abundance of contextual reading relevant to this project. It has helped me understand how to create audience empathy, its effect and the roles of interactivity and installation within it. Empathy plays a huge part in my project as that is the emotion which influences audiences to act upon what they are experiencing, so this contextual reading was vital.

The first of my reading was a book called ‘Interactive Media Arts’ and a chapter within by installation artist Don Ritter titled ‘The Ethics of Interactive Installation’. It began with a detailed definition of interactive installation, highlighting to me the criteria I would be adhering to with my piece:

This reading also taught me a huge amount about the linked relationship between audience judgement and their psychological beliefs (ethics), attitudes and behaviours, and how these aspects heavily effect the reception of works:

Finally it spoke about the social function of media (referencing installations), and in reference to mine, this would be the representation and promotion of human rights around the world:

As I would be trying to teach audiences about the political prisoners I am representing, I researched studies on kinaesthetic learning and interaction. I found a dissertation study by Maiken Hillerup Fogtmann titled ‘Kinaesthetic Empathy Interaction – Exploring the Possibilities of Psychomoto Abilities in Interaction Design’. This reading taught me a lot about the effectiveness of kinaesthetic learning (learning through bodily movement) and how it may be fundamental in my piece:

It also referenced the importance of continual interactive progression in order to keep audiences interested. Translating this theory to my project could mean keeping the initial experiences easy to trigger (floor triggers incidentally set off by walking through the space), and as the audience progress through the space and learn the interactivity of the environment, the triggers become slightly more complicated:

The next studies I looked at were based more around the effects of empathy and the power they wield in an audience context. The first was a journal by Chun-Yang Lee entitled ‘Relationship Between Empathy and Third Person Effect’ which gave me a strong insight into how empathy can create an ‘identification or similarity with unfamiliar others’. The importance of this in my project is that the creation of empathy is fundamental in helping audiences relate to the three political prisoners, in turn initiating them to help the cause:

Another piece of reading, highlighting third person empathy, was a book called ‘The Theory of Narrative Empathy’ by Suzanne Keen. This reading was hugely insightful on the theory of creating empathy for a portrayal of somebody via a medium (for example, the effects of empathy for somebody in a video versus somebody face-to-face). This is a hugely important factor as my audio/visual portrayals will aim to trigger audience empathy, and this reading gave me strong methods of doing so:

‘specific aspects of characterisation, such as naming, description, indirect implication of traits’… ‘depicted actions’… ‘quality of attributed speech, and mode of representation of consciousness’

 This highlighted to me that in order to create empathy for the case-studies I am representing I should give decent back story and character portrayal, in order for audiences to relate to them on a human level:

All this reading was hugely insightful and I plan to refer back to it (and further reading) during the progression of the project, especially during the narrative development stage early in the EMP.

Technical Tests (Stage 3 – Part 2) and Early Build Collaboration:

An important part of this unit was the technical development and testing of trigger ideas, concepts, methods and prototypes. However, I had intended on developing this aspect of the preproduction with technical collaborators, but due to the collaboration not being as extensive as I’d hoped I ended up having to begin the basic elements of this development on my own.

I felt a good start for this would be to begin with what I was relatively familiar with, using a pressure pad to trigger an action (like with Forest Floor). To do this, I took one of the pressure pads from the Forest Floor piece and using a keyboard controller that Liam had given me a few weeks prior; I began to conduct some experiments.

The first experiment I conducted was linking the pressure pad to the computer via the keyboard controller; linking it to the ‘O’ key. I then opened up Word and attempted to trigger by pressing the pad. The reason I conducted this test is that if I can link up audio/visuals to a key-press system or software (the audio/visuals trigger from the letter ‘O’ being pressed for example) then I will have a simple way of triggering the audio/visuals and will not require the creation of a complicated max patch. This is a video of my basic key-press/pressure pad tests:

I then linked this idea into software called processing; using the ‘keyPressed()’ function within it to trigger media through pressing the ‘o’ key, through which I could then attach the pad to the computer via the keyboard controller and trigger it that way. First however, I had to find out how to work the ‘keyPressed()’ function and how this could potentially trigger media. I researched it via the Processing ‘reference’ section on their website and spoke to Liam about how to achieve this. This is a screengrab of the Processing sketch:

And this is a video of it in use:

As an alternative test I then spoke to Tom about MaxMSP and how I could create a basic patch (similar to that of Forest Floor’s) where the use of a pressure pad linked to the computer via an Arduino board or keyboard controller could trigger a piece of video or audio. He created a basic bang, which could be used to trigger media, and we linked this trigger to footage of the Burmese crackdown and start/stop webcam playback alternatively. This is a screengrab of the Max patch:

And this is a video of it in use, though a pressure pad linked via a keyboard controller:

I then moved onto the projection mapping aspect of things. After a fair amount of research and talk with 3^rd and 2^nd year DMP students, the general consensus was that I should look into a software called ‘MadMapper’ I knew that the DMP computers had copies of the software, so I looked into basic tutorials of how to use it on their website:

http://www.madmapper.com/basic-introduction/

Finally, as I felt my idea developed throughout the unit and I had a set of floor plans, conceptual experience ideas and a body of research, I felt now would be a good time to attempt contacting people who may be interested in collaboration on the set design and build of the production a few months down the line. I spoke to a friend of mine called Ben; he had a background in film production and currently works in construction. I asked him about the possibility of collaboration; working to help design and create an interactive set representing a prison cell or something similar in nature. He was very interested in the idea, as it appealed to him in the conceptual design, the interactive nature and the themes of incarceration and human rights. I plan to continue correspondence with him over the next few months in the aim of concreting another collaborator for this project.

Plans for Contacting Relevant Human Rights Organisations – Amended Proposal:

Since the beginning of this project I planned to involve relevant human rights organisations in my project in some way or another. Although as the idea has developed throughout, I moved away from the idea of contacting them early as I felt it would be premature to begin contact until I had a concrete idea of what I was doing and how I intended to do it. I feel I am nearing that stage now, but there still is a little development left to do before I begin correspondence.

However, I still felt that as I had secured the case studies I wanted to represent, this unit would be a good opportunity to research how to contact them directly, why I needed them specifically, how I could help the cause of the case study I was representing and how I should approach the subject.

Firstly, I compiled a list of the organisations which had strong involvement in each of and search each website for their contact email addresses:

Amnesty International

Burma Campaign UK

Iran Human Rights

Free Gao – FreeGao@ChinaAid.org

Now that I had these contact details, I had to be sure my proposal was completely up to date and acceptable for a professional context. This meant refining the current one to an acceptable level where the project is concisely described and the roles removed, subtly graphically designing it and saving as a PDF for sending to each organisation (and collaborator, venue, festival, etc. if necessary).

Once the written side of the proposal had been refined, I spoke to Jack (the graphic designer who designed my floor plans) about how to make the proposal look professional. We discussed the design idea for a while and agreed that subtlety with a very basic colour scheme would benefit the design. We felt working on this over the next few weeks would be the most beneficial idea.

This is the amemnded proposal (subject to change with the development of the project and design alterations):

*

I then needed to know exactly what I intended to obtain from each organisation through the first email I would send, and why each was important. I felt the most important aspect in the early stages of correspondence would be to acquire more information about each case study, in order to help me further understand their situation and to begin building a narrative around them. In this first email, I would also ask about the most effective means of helping the cause of each case study, as I feel the organisations representing them will know the best means of doing so.

I feel that after this initial correspondence I could move on to talking about obtaining any audio or visual media for the piece; whether they had any to provide or if they knew somewhere I should look/ask. The audiovisual media will play an important part in this piece and I feel asking the charities representing each of my case studies how best to obtain it will be a beneficial step.

I feel that before I begin this correspondence however, the project may need some further developing (such as the decision of a name) and I will have to write up some proofread email drafts. Nevertheless I definitely feel I will be at the right stage in the project for this correspondence by the New Year and the beginning of the EMP.

Initial Floor Plans and Trigger/Experience Placement Ideas:

An important part of this unit was the preproduction stage of designing floor plans and trigger layout designs for the interactive installation; developing floor plans through a series of refined layout ideas and working out ways in which experiences can be built into these are the main aims of this stage, all with the overall goal of creating a final floor plan.

I had to take into account all the conclusions I had gained from my experience tests before the conceptual design began, as these were massively insightful results regarding the emotive responses to different experiences and environments.

I began by drawing up a series of general floor plans and layout ideas as initial space idea development:

Each of the three primary ideas had positive and negative attributes, I felt some aspects could work successfully and other maybe less so.

The first plan was three separate (non-interlinking) rooms either aside each other or placed space specifically, all with roughly the same layout but representing each case study individually. The benefits of this layout idea is that once the space is set up it will be self sustained, and (if all went to plan) would not need arranging multiple times as all the case-studies (décor and audiovisuals included) would be portrayed simultaneously.

However, this plan does have a fair few negative aspects, one main example being the scale of setting up a project/space of this nature, as not only is it a lot of work setting up three individual spaces, but it is also necessary to obtain and use three times the amount of décor and technical equipment, which is relatively impractical and expensive. There is also the issue of desensitisation to the subject matter after viewing in three separate spaces. For example, the portrayal of ‘case-study C’ may not be nearly as shocking or effective after the audience has experienced ‘case study B’ and ‘A’, subtracting from the overall effectiveness of the representations and thusly lessening the audience emotive response.

Plan number two is similar in concept to one, in that it will be a space partitioned into three rooms, yet rather than three non-interlinking rooms it will be a progressive narrative journey through the space, covering each room and each represented case study. The benefits of this over plan one, is that the whole space is progressive, leading to a stronger narrative creation and potentially lessened desensitisation (despite this issue still coming into play) due to the alternated layouts of the rooms and more differing experiences. Like the last it would also be self-sustained for the days it was exhibited, not needing the media or décor changed per room.
However, again the issues of the logistics come into play, as setting up a three-room progressive space would need a lot of setup time, a suitable space that could house (or cater to) the specifics of the installation and roughly three times the amount of technical equipment as a single room space.

The third and final of the initial plan ideas, is the idea of a single room in which the case studies are represented individually. How this will be done is not pinned down to a specific method, as the case studies could be portrayed on alternate days, hours or even narratively during the same experience, just not at the exact same time (which could be seen as an issue. I also included the idea of a toilet trigger and multiple projections amongst the room.

There are many benefits to having a single space as opposed to multiple, one fundamental one being the ease of the set-up compared to a three-room installation and the additional freedom this brings when looking for a space to house it. Also, the need for less technical equipment brings freedom in allowing more technical elements in one space (as opposed to 3), as all the technical equipment accessible can be put to use in one room.

However, as mentioned before, the primary issue with this idea is the lack of freedom that comes with only being able to represent a singular case study at a time. If they are to be represented narratively in one exhibition day then strong narrative consideration will have to take place, yet if they are each specifically represented on alternate days or hours then audiences are unlikely to experience all three case studies. If I choose to implement this layout idea (or the others), I will have to work towards creating a method of exhibition where each case study can be portrayed equally and have the same effect on audiences.

Overall, there were aspects from each I liked and disliked, and these can be applied and removed from and to each accordingly, but I felt for now the most effective plan would be basing my idea around the layout concept of plan three, as it seems the most logistical and (if worked correctly) effective installation layout.

Now that I had refined some of these ideas, I felt I should talk to my housemate Jack, a third year graphic design student. He was fortunately willing to create some floor plan diagrams/blueprints for the project (both in this early stage and when the project is more refined) and drew up these plans with guidance from me:

Until the project develops further and new floor plans are necessary, I plan to use these floor plans as a way to generally portray the space environment of the installation.

My Final 3 Chosen Case Studies:

In aid of finally deciding which case studies I planned to represent, I felt I should discuss the matter with Phoebe (now assistant director the project) to get a second opinion and to see what we believed to be the most effective portrayal. After an in depth discussion we came to a selection of conclusions about the most effective means of representation:

1. Firstly, that all three case studies should tie in together with a common aspect of incarceration. Thusly, we felt that political imprisonment of human rights supporters and activists was a prominent example of unjust incarceration and remained apparent through all countries I had looked into. This common factor could then tie in with the design of the piece, becoming a template of representing people who have tried to better human rights in their country and have consequently been imprisoned by their government.

2. Secondly, that we should focus on three separate countries; Burma, China and Iran. These countries have stood out to me during all my research and I feel passionate about helping towards these causes and freeing the politically and unjustly imprisoned of these countries. Also, having three political prisoners from three different countries may help towards the overall theme of the piece, utilising the idea of 3 people incarcerated for similar reasons in different parts of the world. This aspect could also develop the aesthetic, interactive, experience and space design; representing these three people through three separate spaces for example. I plan to develop on this idea as the project progresses.

3. Thirdly, that we should represent a mix of male and female political prisoners, as it is clearly apparent that a majority of the time this incarceration is not gender restricted. I also feel it necessary that women are represented equally in the project, as women’s rights in countries such as Iran are a matter for human rights concern. This is something I will be taking strongly into account when I make the final case study decisions.

4. Finally, that we should write up a shortlist of the politically imprisoned Burmese, Chinese and Iranian human right activists in order to eventually pick one from each country. This is that shortlist:

BURMA:

Zaw Zaw Aung

CHINA:

Liu Xianbin

Liu Xiaobo

Gao Zhisheng

IRAN:

Nasrin Sotoudeh

Ronak Safazadeh

 I then went about making the difficult and important final decisions from this shortlist, taking into account the important factors; such as which case studies would be able to have the most information and media provided about them, which were most unjust and how each story would affect an audience member. Despite the fact that this may be subject change depending on the information I can gain on each case study, the final three I chosen are:

• Burma: Zaw Zaw Aung – Aung is a prime example of a Burmese human rights activist unfairly imprisoned. He has a relatively large dissident following and is a Burmese forerunner for human rights. I feel he will be the most effective case study to represent in the aid of freeing Burma’s remaining political prisoners.

• China: Gao Zhisheng – Gao Zhisheng is a perfect example of China’s tyrannical incarceration of any who ‘defy the state’. Coming from a respected background as a lawyer, his work speaking out against Chinese human rights had him arrested multiple times, and his incarceration and treatment thereof has been hugely unjust.

• Iran: Nasrin Sotoudeh – With not only the poor human rights of Iran, but it’s diabolical women’s rights, I feel Nasrin Sotoudeh is the ideal case study to represent, as she demonstrates both of these. She too has a large activist following and information about her, her work and her case will potentially not be too difficult to source.

I now intend to go about contacting relevant human rights organisations for each case study; in the aid of finding out more information, finding out the best means of aiding the cause and potentially obtaining any relevant audio/visual media.

Initial Collaboration Potential:

Throughout this unit I have been attempting to build a team of collaborators for helping work on the pre-production and future production of the project. Although something I didn’t foresee was how difficult this would proove…

After contacting multiple courses throughout the university (Fine Art, Arts and Events, etc.) I have had a fairly limited overall response. Nevertheless, this is something I can continue to progress as the project develops, and I fully intend to follow up these courses in an attempt to ensure that progression.

However, despite little response from courses thus far, I have had collaborative developments through talking to peers and through spreading the word about the project. Two people have shown strong interest in collaborating on many of the different roles within the project; Tom Moon – who I worked with Forest Floor on, and Phoebe Fleming – who was involve in the interactive tests and has shown strong interest in the piece.

Phoebe:

Phoebe is a first year Film Production student at AUCB. She came to me after finding out about the project, aiming to learn more and asking about ways she could potentially get involved. She is studying film, but has a background in fine art and wants to experiment with installation and alternate mediums.

She has had experience with exhibition curation and is a very politically and ethically motivated person; ideal traits for involvement in the project. I met with her to discuss collaboration and she is interested in taking on some art direction and event management roles. Hopefully this can develop into a production partnership as the project progresses.

Tom:

Like me, Tom is a third year DMP student with an enthusiasm for experience based interactive installation projects. Having worked with him before on an interactive experience piece, I’ve experienced his conceptual mindset, his technical trigger ability and I recognise how this could benefit the piece.

I met with him to discuss collaboration and to find out what he could bring to the piece. He felt he would be interested in getting involved with some basic art direction and design, some technical assistance and some material sourcing; all valuable roles which would benefit the project. However, as he is also currently working on his third year DMP project, the time he can commit may be relatively limited. Despite this, we still felt he would have enough time to be a valuable collaborative asset to the project.

I am very exited about what these two can bring to the project with their involvement, and it is a great start in the collaborative development.

I also am yet to present to the whole of the DMP second year (December 4^th), which has the potential to prove fruitful in the technical assistance and production of the project. Creative elements such as projection mapping, audio and interactive design will hopefully entice second years beginning work on their professional project to collaborate with me.

Further Case Study Research:

To build my body of research and give me a wider range of case studies to choose from, I decided to research some further case studies from Iran and Burma via Amnesty International. So far I have found the case studies from those two regions the most shocking, and felt I should look into others to potentially represent.

Iran:

Sakined Ashtiani:

(Information provided by Amnesty)

 ‘Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, a 44-year-old Iranian woman, was sentenced to death for adultery in 2006. After international outrage, her prescribed punishment of stoning was halted. However, recent reports suggest that she could be executed by hanging at any time.’

Ronak Safazadeh:

(Information provided by Amnesty and iranhumanrights.org)

 ‘Women’s rights activist Ronak Safazadeh is serving six years in prison on charges we believe to be connected to her work for an NGO linked to the Campaign for Equality, an initiative committed to ending legal discrimination against Iranian women. We are calling on the Iranian authorities to release her immediately and unconditionally.’

Burma:

U Myint Aye:

(Information provided by Amnesty)

 ‘Four years ago hundreds of thousands of people in Burma lost their lives when the ferocious Cyclone Nargis attacked the country. Few were left untouched by its force. Millions of families lost their homes. Farmers lost their livelihoods.

 Weeks later, the homeless were forced out of shelters by a government that had already resisted international aid.

 U Myint Aye had seen enough. He set about collecting money to help the most destitute and made it his job to ensure those most in need were given the help he and his colleagues could provide.

 He was promptly arrested. The police who searched his house confiscated lists of those who had given money, and those who had received help.

 During interrogation U Myint Aye’s colleagues were tortured in front of him. They were tortured until he offered a ‘confession’ to charges of funding terrorism. He is now serving life imprisonment in a cell 20 hours’ drive away from his family.’
China:

Liu Xianbin:

(Information Provided by Amnesty)

‘The prominent Sichuan democracy activist has been held on suspicion of “inciting subversion of state power” since being seized by security officers at his home four months ago. Local human rights activists believe he is being punished for his activism and defence of human rights. Liu was first imprisoned in 1992 for his participation in the 1989 pro-democracy movement. In 1998, he co-founded the Sichuan branch of the China Democracy Party. The following year, he was sentenced to 13 years in jail for “subversion of state power”. After his release in November 2008 he continued to speak out against the Chinese government. He was a prominent supporter, together with Liu Xiaobo, of Charter 08, a proposal for fundamental legal and political reform in China that aims to achieve a democratic system that respects human rights. He has also published articles on human rights and democracy and worked to increase public awareness of other persecuted activists. Liu is currently awaiting trial.’

Liu Xiaobo:

(Information provided by The Guardian and Wikipedia)

‘Liu Xiaobo is a Chinese literary critic, writer, professor, human rights activist (and 2010 Nobel Peace Prize winner) who called for political reforms and the end of communist single-party rule. He is currently incarcerated as a political prisoner in Jinzhou, Liaoning.’

I have also found this list of imprisoned Chinese political activists HERE.

Before I decide on my final 3-4 case studies, I will have to carefully consider them. As all are incredibly unjust it will be difficult, and I do not intend to be at all insensitive by not representing specific individuals, but at the end of the day I only have the ability and resources to represent a limited number with this piece. Thusly, I intend to discuss the many case studies I have found and give them careful consideration before I make any final decisions.

Conceptual/Experience Tests (Stage 3 – Part 1):

As stage three of my experience response research, I conducted three experience-based tests with 5 people. The first, a harsh projection in low light with surround sound audio, the second, a combination of surround sound audio in low light and the reading of a passage of text with a corresponding audio monologue playing simultaneously and finally the third, a combination of sensory (visual) deprivation and audio played from beneath/within a pillow.

I recorded each test in use and asked a selection of questions to each participant individually, in order to gain insight into each area of the test. However, I felt the results I gained from these tests were slightly to extensive to write up, and instead I decided to try an alternate method (one I hadn’t tried before) and do a piece to camera about the findings.

This is my video of each test, the questions I asked and their responses:

…And this is the video of the corresponding conclusions that I came to (I recommend watching the videos at the same time):

These are the questions I asked:

Test 1:

1. How did those projections make you feel?

2. Did you find the projections at all overwhelming?

3. Being in a dark room, was your attention automatically drawn to the projections in the space?

4. Did the placement of the sound effect your experience?

5. Do you have any other comments about the space, subject or experience?

Test 2:

1. Did you follow the passage of text at the same pace as the audio monologue?

2. So did the audio monologue alter (slow down/speed up) your reading pace?

3. Did the combination of reading the text and hearing the first-person monologue enhance your emotive response to the experience?

4. Did the surround sound (spatialised audio) and volume alter your experience?

5. What did the lighting signify to you, and how did it affect your experience?

6. Do you have any other comments about the space, subject or experience?

Test 3:

1. How did lying on a pillow to hear audio make you feel?

2. Do you feel listening to it in that manner made it at all more intimate?

3. Could you hear the audio well enough?

4. Consequently, do you feel the audio needed to be clearer or louder, or both?

5. Did listening to the audio in this way alter your empathy towards the subject matter?

Conceiving and Developing the Interactive Elements of the project (Stage 1 an 2):

An important stage of this unit is the conception, development, experimentation and testing of the projects interactive elements. This not only means conceiving ideas for interactively initiated triggers and how these ideas will be most effectively achieved, but most importantly understanding how they will effect the audience. Thusly, I intend to divide this section of the unit into three stages:

1. Trigger idea conception and development:

This will involve considering and brainstorming multiple ideas for potential interactive triggers related to the space and the themes of the project.

2. Experimentation in how to achieve conceptual ideas:

The logistical planning and understanding of the interactive elements will involve consideration into how they will work within the space and in technical terms. Experimentation with different softwares and methods available will be necessary in achieving each trigger’s desired effect. This will eventually result in a set of tests (both technical and audience experiential)

3. The emotive and experiential effects and implications of the interactive experience:

This final stage will consist of experimentation and tests into how audiences may receive certain interactive elements. It will involve interactive, sensory and emotive tests with people, emulating potential audience reaction.

 

Stage 1 – Trigger idea conception and development:

I felt a good way to conceptualise ideas for the piece’s interactive elements would be to create a brainstorm with the subtopics ‘Environment’, ‘Audience Action’ and ‘Interactive Triggers’:

Through this brainstorm I have come up with an initial list of trigger ideas I feel could be incorporated into the piece. I intend to look into each and how they may be achievable:

• Projection mapping/projection onto objects:

–       Projecting televisions onto a box (news report, narratively relelvant footage, etc)

–       Windows onto a wall (cultural referencing)

–       Faces onto a pillow (places subject directly into space)

–       People onto a wall (creates virtual human presence in room)

The space could potentially rely quite heavily on projection (rather than physical items) to portray the story of each case study, allowing the space and triggers to be the same for each and only altering the audio-visual media and decor. This is definitely something to take into account with the development of the space, as it could help with the practicality and logistics of portraying multiple case studies in a single interactive space.

• Audio triggered by audience interactivity:

–       First person subject monologues narratively describing their story of incarceration (portrays subject directly and creates empathy)

–       Audio of news report (describing specific and cultural context)

–       Recreation of the environment via relevant sound (prison guard shouting, touching toilet causes it to flush?)

Like projection, sound could play a fundamental role in how the piece portrays each case study; relying on it as a primary means of representing the story of incarceration and the hardships each of them face. It also has the benefit (similarly to projection) that the space will not need to be altered for each case study, only the audio elements changed.

• Use of low lighting and spotlighting/projection positioning to highlight interactive triggers and prompt audience members:

–       Spotlight on a diary directing audience to open it (opening triggers a first person monologue of what is written)

–       Spotlight on bed (sitting on bed triggers projection/audio)

–       Projection of word ‘Listen’ on pillow (directing audience to listen to audio that may be playing from speaker inside of pillow)

The benefit of this kind of lighting is the signification to audience members that they are the interactive aspects. The use of projection in low light also adds to the aesthetic effect of the piece, especially if the projections are relevant to the subject matter.

• Pressure/touch sensors as method of interactive triggering:

–       Placed on bed (sitting/lying on bed triggers projection/audio monologue, etc.)

–       On floor (walking on/in certain areas of the space triggers specific audio/visuals; walking by the projected window triggers a projection culturally relevant to the subject)

–       On diary (opening diary triggers a monologue of what is written)

–       Toilet flushes when touched?

I feel pressure/touch sensor triggering is an effective way of creating an interactive experience. It works as a tangible way audiences can control the interactive elements of a space and is an easy concept to understand when working out an interactive narrative.

• Random triggers to prompt audiences to not be passive amongst space:

–       Single trigger on floor which triggers a first person monologue giving pretext to the space, or which turns on a light directing audience to the diary, prompting them to further initiate the interactive narrative.

–       If not trigger has been activated for a while, certain audio or visuals can trigger prompting audiences to be active in the space. For example, a prison guard could shout, or the lights could turn off if audiences are not active.

Passive audiences are a problem with interactive pieces (especially when they are narratively driven by that interactivity), so prompts could be an effective way of avoiding this and/or initiating the interactive narrative.

I arranged a tutorial with Liam to discuss these initial trigger ideas and develop on them. The conclusions gained from this meeting meant I could move on to Stage 2; developing a series of technical and conceptual tests to be then carried out in stage 3. These test ideas will help me gain a strong understanding into how I will achieve my interactive ideas, and show me the potential emotive effects on the audience they may have.

 

Stage 2 – Interactive Experience Test Ideas: Technical and Conceptual:

After a lot of thought, I have come up with a set of interactive tests, divided into technical and conceptual:

Technical:

• MaxMSP/Processing tests with a pressure pad to trigger audio/visuals:

This will give me some basic knowledge into the physical triggering of audio/visuals through pressure sensor pads and the use of processing software.

• MaxMSP/Processing tests using a Keyboard Controller:

I plan to use the ‘keyPress’ (file:///Applications/Processing.app/Contents/Resources/Java/modes/java/reference/keyPressed.html) function in processing as a trigger of an action. This will help me gain a very early understanding of how I can use a keyboard controller to activate interactive triggering in my piece.

• Basic projection mapping:

For this I intend to map an object, create a mapped visual for it and project it. This will help me understand the fundamentals of projection mapping and help me begin to implement that into my project planning.

Conceptual:

• Spatialised audio in low light:

I plan to play harsh audio (marches, riots, bombing, etc.) from spatialised speakers surrounding audience and recording emotive response. – This will help me gain an understanding in how people will react to spatialised sound in an installation space.

• Projections as only light source:

I will place ‘audience members’ in a dark room and play a selection of harsh yet politically relevant projections (Burmese riots, marches, etc.) and document the emotive audience response. – This will help me gain a basic understanding into how people may react to visually difficult projections in a dark environment.

• Sensory deprivation:

I intend to place people in situations/environments of mild sensory deprivation (no light, no contact) and record their emotive response. – This will give me insight into how that technique may be received in my piece if I chose to implement it.

• Following a passage of text and corresponding monologue simultaneously: For this I intend to write up a passage of politically relevant text in monologue form, and play said monologue as an audience member begins to read the text. I will then ask the audience member whether this simultaneous audio had an effect into how the text was emotively received, and whether a stronger empathy was felt for the case study having it being spoken (as well as read) as the first person.

• The placement of a speaker underneath/within a pillow:

For this I intend to play a passage of text (or other audio) through a pillow, allowing it only to be audible through lying on the pillow. I would then ask people to listen to this politically relevant monologue and document the emotive response.