Enter the Writers

ENTER THE WRITERS Cinekid MediaLab 2016

Enter the Writers Cinekid MediaLab 2016

Introduction

Paulien Dresscher

A hermetically-sealed globe with fathomless depths, origami land creatures, contracting scales that react to sound, a glowing sphere of oozing lava and sounds hidden in soft black fleece: the MediaLab is a story factory where new tools shape a new vocabulary that appeals to all of your senses. These stories are hidden in the objects, in the screens and in the interaction with the visitor.

Technology is not only a tool, but an influence on who we are: how we work, live, love and even how our brains work. The Internet with its short blogs and clickable links has ensured that we read differently; navigation software has transformed our mental image of the landscape; and social media is causing us to redefine our notion of privacy.

Technology is changing the world we live in, and it is changing us. This does not however mean that we have no choice in how we relate to this technology.

Media art brings humans and technology into contact. Media artists are already experimentally building new tool sets: exploring technologies, applications and interfaces that help to think about how we relate to the world. The resulting 3

artworks show us new applications, new building blocks for stories and also possible futures. Art is thus not only a mirror of our times, but also a laboratory for the future: how to live, how to be human?

Enter the Writers was established to explore, ponder and provide a context for such possible futures. In co-operation with the Domein voor Kunstkritiek (Domain for Art Criticism) and edited

by Anna van Leeuwen, five writers were invited to reflect from their own perspectives upon the works of the MediaLab, and connect them to larger themes in a series of blog posts and essays.

Their fascinating findings and musings are compiled in this publication.

Marijn van der Jagt, journalist and dramaturg, knows how to poetically establish a relationship between the spiritual and the material in which high and low culture do not undermine each other.

Marian Cousijn, curator and journalist, shares her observations on the distinction between the offline and online worlds in both the daily and museum environments.

Marloeke van der Vlugt, artist and researcher, argues in her essay that interactive media art invites us to look critically at the interactive objects we use every day.

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Kaweh Modiri, writer and filmmaker, has written a story from different perspectives in time and place in which he questions the dominance of humans relative to technology.

Above:

ANIMA iki Studio onformative Nick Verstand

Process of Golem Juncheng Chen, Siyuan Jing and Lydia Zhou Interactive Architecture Lab

Dirk Vis, writer and artist, focuses on the artist's material choice, drawing from a rich spectrum of examples that ranges from the Lascaux Caves to the photographic works of Muybridge and H. P. Lovecraft's horror fiction.

Enter the Writers is a bundle of creative brainpower and playful reflection that seeks to unlock the latent intellectual potential of the MediaLab's works by treating them as contemporary 'touchstones'. Technology offers us opportunities, but at the same time dictates. What does that do us?

What can we do with technology? To be able to contemplate these questions is not just a luxury but a necessity!

Index Introduction Paulien Dresscher

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Into the depth Marijn van der Jagt

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Above: Super organism Anna Dumitriu & Alex May

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Online vs. offline Marian Cousijn

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Smart illusion Marloeke van der Vlugt

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Graceful degradation Kaweh Modiri

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Toolbox filled with dreams Dirk Vis

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Enter the Writers

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Colophon

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Image credits

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Into the depth Marijn van der Jagt

Into the depth

Marijn van der Jagt

Hugging a tree. Not an activity that you would expect in Cinekid's MediaLab. But this year, in the technology 'arcade' full of computer games and interactive installations, there really is an an oversized tree trunk. Children in the MediaLab who want to know what’s going on with this bulky colossus are given VR goggles and a special glove. With this equipment, when they throw their arms around the artificial trunk replica, something magical happens. They see and feel a giant sequoia – the biggest tree in existence with a potential lifespan of thousands of years.

The images of this sequoia were filmed by the English collective Marshmallow Laser Feast in California. Players of the interactive Tree Hugger installation do not need to travel all the way across the Atlantic in order to fathom the tree's measurements. Looking upwards with the VR goggles, one experiences the dizzying height of the sequoia. Touching the ancient bark is rewarded by a detailed zoom in, allowing the tree hugger to get lost in the organic landscape.

The Canadian media philosopher Marshall McLuhan described the media with which we surround ourselves as “the extensions of man”: expansions or elongations of our limbs and senses. He wrote this in 1964 in his book Understanding Media, when television was still a new medium.

The ‘verrekijk’ or 'far look', as Dutch author Gerard Reve invariably called the television, extended the viewer's sight

and hearing to the far corners of the world. And all of the devices and means of communication that have since been brought on the market have increasingly allowed us to reach into the distance: faster, more directly, from more places, at any point in time and in ever more fulfilling ways.

Watch and feel Tree Hugger's VR goggles and sensory glove are extensions of our eyes and sense of touch. The makers of the installation enable you to reach out to a tree in California: not only virtually through the filmed images but also literally, with widespread arms that are not able to encircle the broad trunk. You can watch and feel the sequoia up close.

It's as if this is Marshmallow Laser Feast's answer to the Pokémon GO game, currently extremely popular among children. To the delight of many parents, Pokémon GO lures children outside to look for creatures that they can find via a map on their mobile phones, both in their immediate environment and far beyond.

Even children who hate walking can all of a sudden be found in parks and forests, searching for rare Pokémons to add to their collections. The animals they must catch and train possess special natural powers; they can do battle with floods and lightning, with electricity or earthquakes.

But they are illustrated fantasy creatures, with no real con-

nection to the location where you find them. And that also goes for the players of Pokémon GO. Anyone looking for a Pokémon in the park is not looking at the trees but at his or her cell phone.

The players of Tree Hugger do not move physically, but are rather brought to a standstill, and they make contact with a tree that really exists. What is remarkable is that you can experience not only the sequoia's magnitude and bark surface, but that the creators also let you penetrate deeper into the tree's 'being'. A prolonged embrace will allow you to see the sequoia's vibrational energy flow, as portrayed by the makers in virtual reality.

Due to its size and age, the Californian tree is a tourist attraction. Marshmallow Laser Feast offers more than a virtual trip to this famous sequoia. Tree Hugger lets you see and experience how life flows through one of the oldest organisms on our planet.

The dragonfly's superpower The interactive tree is a continuation of the virtual reality project In the Eyes of the Animal, in which Marshmallow Laser Feast lets you see through VR goggles how animals — including a dragonfly, a frog and an owl — experience a forest. From the viewpoint of a dragonfly for instance you see everything in swirling carbon molecules. Not only is

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this a spectacular sight, but it also gives the dragonfly a superpower that transcends human sentience.

Like Tree Hugger, this is a work of art that combines artistic imagination and the possibilities of the newest technology with wonder about the beauty of nature and the sophisticated intelligence of biological life, about which humans still have little knowledge and awareness. We are fascinated by the possibilities of increasingly 'smarter' devices, while we are only now beginning to realise how widespread the communications network is for insignificant organisms such as fungi.

The American science fiction writer Jeff Vandermeer articulated this nicely in an interview about his Southern Reach trilogy, in which he gives the plants and animals in a mysterious nature reserve a sinister consciousness: "When you think about the complexity of our natural world — plants using quantum mechanics for photosynthesis, for example — a smartphone begins to look like a pretty dumb object.”1 At a lecture in London, a member of Marshmallow Laser Feast collective expressed how overwhelmed they were by all of the amazing discoveries they made about complex creatures

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and forces of nature during their project research.

This group of techies became inspired with the mission of using technology in their non-profit work to promote the latest biological and scientific discoveries. A utopian desire, you might say.

But which utopia is depicted in Tree Hugger and In the Eyes of the Animal?

The publicity that accompanies each new device makes it clear that technological progress responds to a desire for contact far beyond our physical reach. A recent advertisement pities a boy in love whose phone subscription makes him wait half a year for a new mobile that lets him also see his girlfriend during a call. It is as if the tender bliss of these new lovebirds is being violated as long as they cannot FaceTime.

We are continually promised a utopia, holds media professor Imar de Vries in his 2012 book Tantalizingly Close. The book is an archaeological investigation of the myths surrounding the peddling of new communications inventions to humans. One utopia that advertisements remind us about each day is the perfection of interpersonal contact: if only we have the right medium in our hands, contact with our fellow humans, wherever in the world they may be, will be easier and more complete.

In the tree

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In a sense, Marshmallow Laser Feast's VR projects conform to this idea of progress. The technology used offers the possibility of contact beyond our physical reach. But the true spectacle presented by these interactive installations is the reach for depth rather than distance. With In the Eyes of the Animal you experience the surrounding forest from the perspective of the animals that live alongside us. With Tree Hugger you can look inside the tree with a kind of x-ray eyes. As if you, like the dragonfly, perceive life on earth through the basic elements from which it is composed: molecular particles, energy flows, the light that a tree converts into nutrients through photosynthesis.

You could call this a movement inward. This same shift is happening in the various communication devices, apps and gadgets that have come onto the market in the past decade. Joggers run around with heart rate monitors and pedometers, office workers can track their energy use and movement, for dieters there are BMI calculators and calorie counter apps, and for hypochondriacs there are home tests for bowel disease and lung disorders. Devices measure or regulate the indoor climate or the uptake of oxygen in the blood,

Treehugger Marshmallow Laser Feast Above: Pokémon GO Photo: Willem Groeneveld 1 An Interview with Jeff VanderMeer, “Full Disclosure, I’m Really A Komodo Dragon”,

by Lincoln Michel in BuzzFeed, 15 March 2014, https://www. buzzfeed.com/lincolnmichel/ jeff-vandermeer?utm_term=. nr7OlYmWg#.vhqYVywkW

and those who want to protect their ears can buy a decibel meter.

Seismologists are currently calling for the introduction of a mobile phone-based notification system for earthquakes in countries with little money and infrastructure, as the sensors in smartphones seem applicable to the early detection of subterranean vibrations. This is a life-saving interpretation of the vibration function of cell phones. This signal – which elicits the physical reaction of a quicker-beating heart through fear or expectation in the smartphone owner – could thus be linked to the turbulence of the volcanic magma deep below our feet.

This is an extension of the person that McLuhan – in a period when earthquakes were still measured with cumbersome instruments – could not have foreseen. These developments are made possible as technological inventions become smaller, more manageable and more portable.

Every touch and movement The PC that stood on a desk opposite the user ten years ago, the telephone, stereo system and television that each had a permanent place in the living room, and the camera that was only taken out of the closet on special occasions: these have been merged and reduced to a paper-thin tablet, a smartphone or a smartwatch worn close to the skin. Displays previously operated with buttons have been transformed into sensitive screens that register every touch and movement of our fingers.

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The latest development is the use of the surface of the skin as a keyboard to control a device that is too tiny to have its own keyboard.2 The distance between 'hard' machines and the 'soft' human body is disappearing in an almost breathing, pulsating interaction between human and matter.

In Tantalizingly Close, Imar de Vries cites French media philosopher Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, who although he is much less known than Marshall McLuhan preceded him in a visionary analysis of technological progress.

In his 1959 book Le Phénomène Humaine, de Chardin, who was also a paleontologist and a theologian, proposed that all matter is ultimately reducible to the same substance. He saw the development of our earth in three stages: first there was the geosphere (the crust), and then the biosphere was formed (life with all of its organisms). He called the next stage, which would be established in the future with the help of networks of technological inventions, the 'noosphere'. All terrestrial organisms, matter and human-made machines would unite in the noosphere as one big consciousness. It was all a bit esoteric and eccentric, as Teilhard de Chardin considered the basic substance constituting all earthly phenomena to be ‘divine’. Furthermore, regarding the energy flows that would connect everything in the future, he suggested that the technological exchange of signals was similar to a telepathic coordination of all human brains.

Yet Teilhard de Chardin’s vision is quite applicable to the consciousness being developed half a century after he formulated his theories, due to the latest technologies and

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Blogpost: Something to hold on to, Marijn van der Jagt

The importance of weight and volume is seriously underestimated in the quest for ever smaller devices. Just as with a loved one, you want to have something to hold on to. The complaint that you can’t slam down the receiver of a mobile phone after a frustrating conversation is not just a nostalgic one. Given this device is so important in everyday life, you also want to be able to put up a fight.

Nowadays you are punished by your own guilt when you furiously slam your phone down on the table: shocked, you immediately check if the poor thing still works. You can no longer take your emotions out on equipment, as all that remains is a feeble rebuke.

It was recently announced that American scientists have developed a technique that uses the human arm as a touchscreen for operating a smartwatch. This method is necessary, as the buttons on the unit are so small that either the users can’t see them or their fingers are too thick to operate them.

Rage resulting from difficult communication with others, or a slow Internet connection, can now be vented on one’s very own limbs. The technique still needs improvement, according to scientists, because sweaty skin creates problems in the operation of the arm. Amusing images come to mind: limbs that have been abused by sharp nail imprints, chafed red 'rub' spots, or bruised memories of an angry pinch.

Maybe this hitch in technological progress isn’t so unpleasant. At least you have something to hold on to, albeit only your own body.

scientific discoveries. You can see the 'internalisation' that he predicted in Marshmallow Laser Feast's interactive projects. And also in the quest by artists/fashion designers for 'smart clothes' – that via sensors registering heat, skin moisture levels, heart rate or physical proximity – provide information about the emotional life of the wearer. The Los Angeles-based designer Noori Farahi for example developed a piece of women's clothing entitled Caress of the Gaze. The upper part that covers the wearer's neck, shoulders and chest is an artificial 'skin' full of soft spines that make wave-like contractions like a living organism. This contraction happens in reaction to the gaze of someone standing before the wearer; a camera in the artificial skin records how the eyes of the 'viewer' move over the clothing and the underlying body.

Although we are hardly aware of it, this 'body scanning' is something that everyone does.

Farahi's garment provides a physical response to the inquisitive, sometimes erotically charged look without the wearer being able to exert any influence. Caress of the Gaze represents an animal interaction between bodies that usually escapes our civilised consciousness, taking place at the level of energy and impulses, in the action of hor-

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mones and body fluids. It reminds the wearer that humans are also beings of nature.

Celestial body Two other interactive works of art that can be experienced at the 2016 MediaLab reflect the same organic internalisation: ANIMA and Fiet, two 'living' objects created by Dutch artists.

Fiet by Studio Toer is a white, cloud-like sculpture that hangs above the player, with a movable surface formed entirely of hollow cones. When the player makes a sound the 'skin' responds with contractions, giving the impression that this creature is alive and aware of its surroundings.

ANIMA by Nick Verstand is a screen in the form of a giant sphere. Images are projected from the inside onto the surface of the globe, forming liquid patterns in changing colors that seem to move in response to the viewer's presence. It is a bustling, vibrant ball of energy.

Fiet is reminiscent of a mysterious animal that lives on the ocean floor, whereas Anima evokes an alien celestial body. Both may be discoveries that humans can perceive only due to inventions that let us reach into the distance. Yet you do not view them remotely (the ‘far look’); they are 'lifesized' objects in your proximity, and they relate to

your presence and to your body.

You can play with these lifelike creatures without touching them. And the relationship you create with them is intimate, sensual and purely physical. They are bodies. The awareness that they insinuate ― using sensors and sophisticated motor control, cameras and moving projections ― is a fine example of state-of-the-art technology. And yet they bring the players back to their own nature. They reflect what else a human is: a wonderful product of life on earth, breathing, throbbing and vibrating with energy. That is what the MediaLab lets children and their accompanying parents experience this year. Hugging a tree. Embracing life. In an Amsterdam arcade full of technological gadgets, Teilhard de Chardin’s eccentricity is proven right. •

Page 11: Treehugger Marshmallow Laser Feast Page 12: Caress of the Gaze Behnaz Farahi Above: Fiet Studio Toer

Online vs. offline Marian Cousijn

Online vs. offline Marian Cousijn For Enter the Writers, Marian Cousijn researched how our lives are divided into online and offline, both inside and outside the art world. A selection of these articles, which previously appeared as blog posts, are presented here as a triptych.

scribed a shelf in his house where he stores his phone: if he really needs the thing he has to walk there to get it. I wanted to know more about both of these approaches.

1 Always online?

Paulien: The freedom of always being available

I don’t really have a policy for being online. Sometimes I'm happy to leave my phone at home the whole day; the next day I may mindlessly check my phone every half minute or so to see if a new (and usually totally unimportant) message has arrived. Before I know it, I have disappeared for 45 minutes into the vortex called social media. In fact, the latter scenario is more common. The Internet can destroy my focus: when I really need to concentrate, unplugging the router is sometimes the only thing that works.

I am researching the theme 'online vs.offline' for Enter the Writers, which led to a discussion at our first meeting on the subject. Paulien Dresscher, head of new media at Cinekid and curator of the MediaLab, said that the very first thing she does after opening her eyes in the morning is to check her e-mails. She does not understand people who suddenly stop responding during a WhatsApp conversation. Conversely, writer Dirk Vis de-

If I mail Paulien, she replies within a few minutes.

When can I call? Anytime, actually. Like this afternoon, while she was driving in the car. Paulien: “In 1996 I got my first mobile phone. I found it so extraordinary that I could call while lying on the beach! People who arrive at work at nine and who haven’t read their mail yet: I find it really incomprehensible.” It was not a conscious decision on her part to always be accessible; it has just evolved that way. “It's part of my job. And besides that I live on a ship, so I didn’t even have a landline. The very fact that I am almost always reachable gives me a lot of freedom. It is also a question of time management: if I get a lot of work done during a flight, then I have time left for other things.”

Paulien remains online even during her holidays.

“We often vacation on our boat, so I use apps to navigate. But I also check my work e-mail. This means I can take three weeks of vacation. It only complicates things if I'm not available.” Is she

really always online? “I also recognise that it's not good to be immersed in an online bubble all day long. I consciously don't take out my telephone when I'm on the ferry to Amsterdam North: I just look around. And during meals I also put it away, to be social with my family. Sometimes my online habits are disastrous by the way: at work recently I was clicking mindlessly on a funny video that popped up and it turned out to be a virus. It was sent to all my contacts, and I had to change my passwords. I definitely got a taste of my own medicine!

Page 16 and above: The Do Not Disturb function iPhone, Marian Cousijn Below: Nikon Camera

Dirk: Sometimes you just don't feel like it And when can I ring Dirk? He mails me back: “I always turn on my iPhone between 19:00 and 19:02.” He’s joking of course, but Dirk clearly has a different policy than Paulien. At home, his phone is never within reach, he has hardly installed any apps, and all notifications are turned off. Today he had it turned on especially because he knew I would call.

Dirk: ”Discipline is very important if you want to write. With some things, like reading, I allow myself to be completely indulgent. But in other areas I make rules for myself. The phone doesn't enter my bedroom anymore, and I turn it on in

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the morning only after I've had a coffee and have read a few articles. I have all of the notifications turned off: I want to decide when I look at my phone, instead of my phone dictating that by sending me messages.”

Dirk got the idea of the ‘phone shelf’ while working as a supervisor at a children's holiday camp. “The kids there don’t use electricity throughout the week. The supervisors are allowed to carry phones, but they are stowed in a box and used only when absolutely necessary, for example to call your loved ones.” Do Dirk’s friends find it annoying that he is so often unreachable? “No, they disconnected even before I did. I also noticed that sometimes they just didn’t respond to my messages, and then I thought: “Oh yes, that's actually just fine.” If someone rings your doorbell, like a Jehovah’s Witness or someone trying to sell you something, you often don’t feel like opening the door. So why do you need to react immediately when someone calls you?”

Considering my own shelf I recognise a lot of myself in both stories. But unlike Paulien, I don’t use my time online so efficiently. I don’t really want to answer e-mails yet if I'm still lying in bed. So why do I open them then? Out of habit, out of boredom, or because I'm a little addicted? Maybe it's also something for me, this telephone shelf.

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2 Smartphone terror Smartphone terror in the museum? It’s not always what it seems.

A group of students sit on a museum bench, engrossed in their smartphones. In the background is The Night Watch, but none of the adolescents grant Rembrandt’s masterpiece as much as a glance. The photo (taken by art historian and journalist Gijsbert van der Wal in 2014) went viral on social media, accompanied by gloomy captions. “You see: technology is the end of civilisation!”; “A disappointing metaphor for our society!”; “What’s wrong with today’s youth: so addicted to their dumb smartphones that they would rather stare listlessly at a screen than look at true beauty?”

But the actual story was that the children had first looked extensively at the painting, and were at the time of the photograph immersed in an assignment using the Rijksmuseum’s app that provides additional information about the artwork.

This reminds me of a story that a colleague at the Stedelijk Museum once told me. One day, the famous rapper Usher graced the Stedelijk with a visit. He had to perform that night in Amsterdam, and made the admirable decision to spend a day in the modern art museum rather than visiting coffee shops in the Red Light District. He was promptly rewarded with a private tour around the collection.

The rapper seemed quite distracted: he was continuously busy with his iPhone. At a certain point, the tour arrived

at the Between Screens project by the artist duo Olivier van Breugel and Simone Mudde. The project consists of photographs taken in the main gallery of the Rijksmuseum, and shows throngs of people looking at The Night Watch through their smartphones. The critique is clear: there are great reproductions of The Night Watch, so why the urge to make your own snapshot? Or – still worse – a selfie taken by turning one’s back on the masterpiece and simply degrading it to a backdrop. The accompanying text states: “Capturing everything is lethal to the memory, it makes us into robots, even lazy robots, who can reproduce perfectly but because of that reproduction have nothing more to say.”

Usher’s girlfriend, who had participated actively in the tour and kept asking interested questions, responded to Between Screens by remarking on Usher’s phone behaviour: “Look honey, these people are just like you, more focused on their phone than on the art!” Usher fired back in defence. It appeared that he had been diligently taking notes about everything explained by the guides right from the beginning of the tour.

Not everything is what it seems Personally, I always have my phone at hand when I visit a museum. As an art journalist I find it a very useful tool: I use the camera to take visual notes. A snapshot of a museum hall is a very good memory support, and with a push of

a button I have a complete wall text in my pocket. I also have more time to look at the art if I don’t have to jot everything down in a notebook.

I like to share the most beautiful works of art that I come across on Instagram. Yes, I can also just search the Internet for photos of these works. But that takes a bit longer, and I also enjoy building a personal collection of art that I have seen in real life.

The sharing on social media happens later, not immediately. The ‘risk’ of using your smartphone is of course that you grab it to make a photo and before you know it you are distracted by 13 new mails and 46 unanswered WhatsApp messages while standing among the Picassos. But there is a very useful feature for that: the offline mode.

When I walk through the museum with my phone ready, I am well aware of how it must look. There are probably other visitors who think along the lines of the indignant commenters on Gijsbert van der Wal’s photo. The Van Gogh Museum banned photography altogether in 2014 after visitors complained of ‘smartphone terror’. I admit that I sometimes feel a bit relieved in an exhibition with a photo ban: no stress to make that perfect shot. But I also regret that I can’t share my experience or add the works of art to my virtual private archive.

Of course the idea is not to use your smartphone so antisocially that it inconveniences your fellow visitors. But a smartphone has a lot to offer, and the sight of people

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staring intently at their screens is not always what it seems.

And even then: so what if someone would rather play Candy Crush than worship Rembrandt? The real problem is not that people use smartphones in museums, but the accompanying prejudices.

Below: Smartphone terror in front of the Mona Lisa in the Louvre Museum, Stockphoto

3 Hiding in a cosy tent

Above: Faraday tent

You are safe in an automobile during a thunderstorm, even when lightning strikes. That's because an auto is a 'Faraday cage', made of electrically-conductive material that blocks electric fields outside the cage.

This physical principle also applies to electromagnetic radiation fields such as GSM and Wi-Fi networks. They are invisible, but we spend our days surrounded by them. The Faraday cage acts as a shield against this radiation. Artist Sarah van Sonsbeeck took this fact as the starting point for a series of works. Silence is a recurring theme in her work: what are the spatial aspects of silence, and to what extent does noise affect your privacy?

Cell phones are perhaps the greatest silence disruptors of our time. In an interview, Van Sonsbeeck explains: “I noticed that I was busy with the thing all day, just like my friends and my partner.

We are surrounded at all times by an invisible noise. That's why I made the Faraday Bag: a portable form of silence.” When you put your phone in the bag, you are no longer reachable. The label reads: “This bag is made from Faraday fabric, a democratic instrument for data silence.”

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Of course, you can always turn your phone off.

But this work of art makes you think: to what extent do we have a right to silence? In fact, the Faraday Bag accidentally turned out to be illegal, which for Van Sonsbeeck made it an even better artwork: “What happens inside a Faraday cage is uncontrollable. That means you also can also use it to steal, as it will not set off the security gates in shops. That the bag turned out to be illegal says something about our fears and the need to monitor and scan everything.”

The reverse is also true. Putting your wallet into the bag protects you against crowd hacking, a wireless variation of pickpocketing. Just as you can pay wirelessly using your debit or smart card, they can also be emptied wirelessly.

Van Sonsbeeck also made a tent using the same material. I saw this Faraday Tent (2011) at an exhibition: a small, simple, old-fashioned tent made of thin silver fabric. But despite its cosiness, the tent is a hi-tech political protest about the right to not always be traceable and accessible. This tent is just about the only place where you can't be traced via your phone. But you can, of course, have a good conversation with someone standing next to the artwork. •

Sarah van Sonsbeeck Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Smart illusion Marloeke van der Vlugt

Smart illusion Marloeke van der Vlugt In an infomercial1 that I came across while browsing on YouTube, an enthusiastic, bespectacled inventor explained a new innovation. The sleek, shiny Smart Pipe, easy to install in your toilet, will catch your stool and analyse it on the spot. This allows germs and bacteria to be detected at a very early stage. You receive tips and tricks via your smartphone to keep your intestinal flora in top shape. Potential disorders are tweeted to the relevant authorities so that they can respond in a timely manner and prevent related undesirable behavior.

In order to match the right person to the right excrement, the Smart Pipe takes an anal photo during the first use. The collected and stored information can then be shared or sold. According to the infomercial, many companies are interested in the metadata. For example, how do your bowel movements relate to your coffee machine or to the (too tight?) clothing you wear? With this information, restaurants can offer you tailor-made dinners that cater perfectly to your particular constitution. All information will be secured on a server and maintained by Smart Pipe.

The Smart Pipe is of course a parody, but it is easy enough to fall for it. There are currently so

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many self-regulating, networked but often nonsensical products2 brought on the market that the Smart Pipe seems feasible.

I was struck by the video, as it brings together various aspects of how we relate to interactive devices and the Internet of Things (IoT). The IoT is a collective term for objects, spaces and devices that are connected via a digital network and can independently receive, collect and send data. The Smart Pipe video by Cartoon Network is a striking example of our complex relationship with objects that are 'brought to life' with the help of technology.

objects are unpredictable or uncontrollable, and worry about the consequences for our privacy.

The devices fascinate us, we find them attractive and exciting, but deep down we also feel distaste or even disgust for these 'living objects'.

The Smart Pipe video immediate gives rise to these mixed feelings. Although we are revolted by the idea of a photographing toilet bowl, the video simultaneously tries to tempt us with 'futuristic' promises and we may be enticed by the intimate secrets held by this intelligent plumbing system.

Smart Pipe is so extreme that our reactions, veering between attraction and repulsion, will also be extreme.

Better, easier and more efficient?

The arresting advertising campaigns and the attractive aesthetics of the smart thermostat and the self-monitoring alarm system are tempting purchases: we didn't know that they existed, but now that we know we want to own them. The hip neighbour – an early adopter – enthusiastically tells the same convincing story: the devices will make our lives better, easier and more efficient.

At the same time, these objects evoke something else: the uncertainty of the unknown. What exactly are we bringing home? We fear that the

Smart seduction The communication between 'smart object' and consumer, from the moment of purchase until the actual use, is focused on seduction. However, the practical interaction with the technological object often seems difficult to understand, and may result in a diffuse and unequal relationship.

To what extent do these digitally-networked objects actually listen to us? Or do they bypass us?

Whereas a good conversation is interactive and shares a common goal, the response capacity of

Page 24 and above: Eye Catcher, mechanics Lin Zhang and Ran Xie 1 See: https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=DJklHwoYgBQ

2 For example, ‘Anatomic Shoes’ that do nothing more than turn the Wi-Fi on or off, the ‘HidrateMe Smart Water Bottle’ that monitors your water intake, or the ‘Musical Tampon’ that allows your unborn fetus to listen to your musical mix.

these devices is limited and the goal is often commercial.

Although the devices record our needs, the programmed output is fixed and difficult to change.

Take for example a 'smart' coffee machine that brews coffee at a specific time. The timing is linked to the location of your iPhone, so when you approach home the machine begins to brew. But what if you don't feel like drinking coffee when you come home? Do you drink it anyhow? After all, it's ready! And what about when the coffee machine keeps tweeting you that you've run out of coffee beans? Do you immediately run to the store? Or do you let the machine order online for you?

There are numerous examples of when a system initially seems to communicate with you, but over time ends up determining your behaviour. In other words, what is provided is the semblance of equivalent interactivity, camouflaged in an attractive form. How this 'temptation' process works with the passage of time is often hard to fathom: suddenly you seem only able to respond and you have lost control. The coffee machine keeps ordering coffee beans, and this setting can't be changed.

Such a process can lead to frustration and feelings of powerlessness.3 I experience these feelings when I have the idea that I'm not being heard, and can't exert any influence to change that. When I feel like my life is being lived, rather than that I'm living it. When too little attention is paid to me as a person, and too much to me as a part in a digital network.

The ability to analyse the origin of these feelings is one of the reasons I make interactive, technology-based art. I challenge myself to take the time to explore how I relate to the digitally-networked world around me. I observe myself, and step by step unravel my (physical) interaction so that I can experience it consciously and understand what is happening.

For a deeper exploration of the concept of interactivity in relation to the IoT, I'll take a closer look at the Eye Catcher installation created by Lin Zhang and Xie Ran in the Interactive Architecture Lab in London. This interactive technological installation can be seen this year at Cinekid's MediaLab.

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Blogpost: A Step Back, about the episode of Tegenlicht examining why people turn away from the Internet and other technological innovations, Marloeke van der Vlught One recent spring evening I watched a television programme called

Offline is the New Luxury. It showed how the Internet giants Google and Facebook are busy getting the whole world online. Drones, satellites and balloons with transmission capacity are being launched in order to provide the most remote places with Wi-Fi. Here you go, for free and with no strings attached... A tangible ‘cloud’, that literally looks down on us.

The Internet ensures that we are digitally connected with each other and with the world around us. In addition, a large number of objects are now interconnected, together forming the ‘Internet of Things’.

Each time a unique artwork

The signal from my smartphone opens the door to my garage when I

What are the characteristics of an interactive and technological work of art? The most important criterion for interactivity is the spectator's influence on the artwork. When the spectator does something, there is a change in either the appearance, the movement or the physical state of the work.

This is just one side of the coin: of course, the viewer reacts first to the original state of the work and tries to change something with his or her behaviour.

But as far as I am concerned a work is only interactive if the resulting change then again challenges the spectator's behaviour, and so on and so forth. A dialogue arises between the viewer and the artwork that transforms the viewer into a participant, performer or even co-creator. Further

approach my house. The desired temperature is set, the lights go on

An interactive work of art is therefore a semi-finished project: participants are needed in order to 'finish' the work.4 There are however degrees of interactivity. On the one hand, there are works in which the limits of the interactivity are clearly indicated, such as with the Eye Catcher. The interaction is simply the way to communicate with the work. On the other hand there are installations where the possibilities appear endless and unpredictable: for example those based on certain computer algorithms that can evolve ad infinitum.

But no matter what degree of interactivity they possess, these works require a certain attitude from the public: something or someone must take action ― and invest time – in order to experience the overall result of the intended artwork.

for which these digital resources and expressions were designed.

and the oven will soon be pre-heated.

It does not matter whether I press the digital garage button myself, or if the mobile device in my pocket does it for me. In both scenarios, the message is sent over the Internet. From the perspective of the Cloud, a person is only one of a number of smart objects transmitting data.

We ourselves help to achieve this objectification. We post our ideal photos, tweet our thoughts and ‘like’ in order to be liked. We use the keyboard and mouse, and ‘talk’ through emoticons, abbreviations and symbols. In doing this we reduce our own unique and physical communication capabilities to those of the computer. By using the standard apps, we become part of the homogeneous, uniform group

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reasoning implies that a unique artwork will continuously be created with real interactivity: after all, each person is different, will react in his or her own way and provide other input.

Let's look at the Eye Catcher installation. This is composed of a simple photo frame mounted on a white wall.

There is no image; the frame seems to be empty. When the visitor walks by, the frame slides across the wall to follow the visitor.

When the visitor stops and looks, the frame positions itself at eye level in front of his or her face. The dark fluid hidden at the bottom of the frame clusters together and two black eyes emerge. A hidden video camera registers the facial expression of the visitor. The magnetic black liquid reacts by drawing eyes that express basic emotions.

Imagine thoughtfully squinted eyes, piercing bright eyes or a happy, sparkling gaze resulting in eyes that look like they are exploding.

Is this work interactive? When we apply my previous definition, the answer is yes. The frame moves with the visitor, and the liquid responds to his or her facial expression. The visitor then moves differently in order to make the frame shift, and the liquid forms to display different expressions.

The number of emotions the magnetic fluid can express is limited. Still, the result will always differ, as each visitor explores his or her own unique series of interactive possibilities. Thus a different story is visually composed over and over again, creating a unique presentation.

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At the same time, we leave enormous amounts of data traces behind. These are collected and analysed, for example on commission from commercial interests or (political) organisations that want to predict – or possibly correct - our behaviour.

Above: Eye Catcher, mechanics Lin Zhang and Ran Xie Left: Coffee machine Marketingmanager.nu via

Mirror Here also lies the crux: an interactive work reflects our own actions, our decisions and their consequences. Indeed, interactive technology functions as a mirror that reflects not only myself as participant but also takes my actions as input to modify and react to.5 The interaction thus says something about ourselves in relation to our environment and allows us to experience this relationship.

What does the Eye Catcher reflect to us? In this work, the limits of interaction are quickly apparent. Communication works only within the predefined technological framework: when the viewer moves, the frame moves with him or her. If

Flickr Creative Commons 4 ‘The recipient becomes the performer’, from: Katja Kwastek, Aesthetics of Interaction in Digital Art, The MIT Press, 2015, page xvii.

5 Loosely from: David Rokeby, Transforming Mirrors, Suny Press, 1996

the viewer looks, the frame shifts to eye level. The frame thus requires very precise actions from the viewer; otherwise it does nothing. And the spectator does exactly as requested; otherwise he or she does not see the installation in full action.

Next, the spectator influences the magnetic fluid, but the possibilities here are also limited.

The shape of the liquid is actually the result of a preprogrammed facial recognition system that determines which emotions the viewer exhibits based on an average. The system thus determines whether someone is angry or happy, and reacts with a predefined 'answer'.

The viewer is hereby voluntarily restricted to become part of the homogeneous, uniform group for which the system is designed. And thus the viewer - unconsciously – limits his or her own unique and physical communication possibilities to the options put forth by the computer.

Remarkably, despite the Eye Catcher's limited capacity for interaction it still feels like you are communicating with the frame in a transparent and equitable manner. But, as with the IoT, this is not true. Something else happens during the interaction that allows us to feel connected with the object.

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For mutual benefit Now what exactly is the appeal of this installation? It is no more than a square brown frame, a white background and a simple drawing of two eyes. But the object exhibits behaviour, and this evokes a strong emotional response from the viewer. The creators of the Eye Catcher talk about the experience of an 'uncanny' feeling when an object seems to be alive although we know that it is not. This confusion leads to the feeling that 'real' contact and a connection with the object has been made.

The Internet of Things also works in this way.

Smart objects sell themselves as attractive systems that will take over certain actions and tasks in equal communication with us. They appear to want to co-operate with us for our 'mutual benefit', as with the Smart Pipe.

And why do we believe this? As with the Eye Catcher, we are attracted to these devices because they appeal to human communication, to our bodies and to our senses: Siri talks to you, Google Car seems to wink and opens the door for you. The Smart Pipe shows our hidden innards – our bowels – to ourselves and the outside world.

A 'living' object such as the Smart Pipe crosses a line and becomes a taboo. It comes too close,

and that is why we find such objects exciting.

Moreover, living objects fit into the category described by French philosopher Julie Kristeva as 'abject'.6 Her theory can help to clarify our fascination with this type of object.

Kristeva suggests that as we grow up, we learn that the elements forming the boundary between our bodies and the outside world – such as the eyes, mouth, anus, genitals and associated bodily fluids – are 'indecent' or 'disgusting'. According to her theory, the rejection of these 'abject' elements, which we find simultaneously attractive and repulsive, is part of becoming an adult.

So we hide our tears, keep our saliva in our mouth, close the toilet door, or urinate behind a tree. And as a consequence of this rejection, for the rest of our lives we experience loss or nostalgia: we (un)consciously still long to overstep the imposed boundaries and rules, disrupting the system and the order.7 When we are confronted with an object that exhibits human behaviour, it appears that we project our desire for the abject upon the object. And this desire is fuelled when the object displays some abject elements, such as orifices or juices.

This is the case with both Smart Pipe (showing excrement) and Eye Catcher (communicating via

Above: Eye Catcher Lin Zhang and Ran Xie 6 Julie Kristeva, Pouvoirs de l’horreur. Essai sur l’abjection, Le Seuil, 1982

7 Loosely from: ‘Spreken om het leven. Vrouwelijke subjectiviteit in het postmoderne theater’, Mieke Kolk, Tijdschrift voor Genderstudies, #1 1998

fake eyes with our eyes and facial expressions).

This makes them attractive and fascinating.

At the same time, these objects invoke resistance by confronting us with the abject: that which cannot be shown (our innards) and that which is not supposed to be alive (an object). In order to explore this ambivalent and unacceptable feeling, we let ourselves be seduced. We want to experience the taboo – what is not possible, what is not allowed, what must remain hidden – with goosebumps of disgust and delight.

Uncanny valley And what about the aesthetics of smart objects?

Must the objects have our physical characteristics to enable this projection? To what extent can the shape of the object can be abstracted and still be experienced as alive?

In 1970, Dr. Masahiro Mori, a professor of engineering science at the University of Tokyo, studied the following question: when a robot looks increasingly human-like, does our affinity with it grow? What he found was that we do not accept a robot that appears too realistic. When the robot looks too much like us, we reject it.

He called this result 'bukimi no tani', which was later translated as 'the uncanny valley'. The

translator probably chose the word 'uncanny' ('bukimi' can also mean 'strange' or ‘creepy’) as it resonates with Sigmund Freud's 1919 essay entitled Das Unheimliche. This essay was translated in 1960 as The Uncanny.

'Unheimlich' literally means 'homeless'. Freud described 'Das Unheimliche' as an ancient and elemental sense of fear that is inseparable from us – as humans – and thus also evokes a certain recognition.8 The term therefore seems to overlap with Kristeva's abject,9 although the feelings of attraction and recognition are lost and directly replaced by rejection (such as with the human robot). The precarious balance between attraction and repulsion turns into the latter. Fear also plays a role: a familiar inanimate thing can become too alive and too real, expelling us from our home.10 Designers thus ensure that technological objects avoid forms that are too human. But devices must cohere to the contemporary ideal of beauty.

That is not too difficult, as the current human ideal of beauty seems in fact to be inspired by machines. A flawless body and a high level of controllability are required. The skin should no longer display its natural 'hairy' state. As a result, we shave from head to toe in order to be as smooth and shiny as a machine. The media

depicts the ideal man with a 'hard body': imprisoned in an unnatural solid shield as if the skin is made of plastic or metal.11 Objects thus have a shiny, smooth surface and a tight but 'sensual' form. This aesthetic is immediately recognisable in the sleek Smart Pipe and other commercial devices like smart thermostats.12 But the Eye Catcher also plays with these features: the eyes are reduced to simple but expressive lines, and the frame hangs on a pristine white wall.

8 Paragraph based on Frank E. Pollick, ‘In search of the uncanny valley’, University of Glasgow, 2010

9 “The concept of abjection is often coupled (and sometimes confused) with the idea of the uncanny, the concept of something being ‘un-home-like’, or foreign, yet familiar” from: J. Childers/G. Hentzi (eds), The Columbia

Practise to become smart As previously described, there are various facets to the allure of a 'living technological object'. To see through and understand this attraction, we need opportunities to ‘practise’ interacting with it. I see an important role for interactive technological art here; the genre of artwork that (re) presents the relationship between technology, objects, spaces and the human body and offers the possibility to zoom in on, experience and then analyse the interaction that takes place These artworks give people the opportunity to explore how the complex relationship with the outside digitally connected world takes shape.

Of course this only works when the experience is

Dictionary of Modern Literary and Cultural Criticism, 1995. From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Abjetion#cite_note-13

10 Tuur Deven in: ‘Theater der dingen: een leegte zonder menselijk leven’, De Wereld van het Poppenspel, Summer 2016, page 61

11 Loosely from: ‘Het tijdperk van de gladjanus’, Anneke Smelik in: Deus ex Machina, jrg 34, nr 133, June 2010

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translated to the daily environment, such as the internet-connected house.13 The Eye Catcher's frame on the wall appears to stimulate this by referring directly to one's own cosy home.

So: allow the shining, magnetic eyes of the Eye Catcher to draw you in. Then take the time to 'look back' at the eyes: walk by again, change your expression, test all of the possibilities and seek the limits of the interaction. Experience how this makes you feel.

During the Cinekid Festival you can look behind the smooth white wall. So take the chance to meticulously consider, examine and analyse the technology that would normally remain hidden: the rails, which allow only one specific route for the frame to travel, and the visible control of the frame by a computer. The electrical wires, like long, tousled hairs that connect the components together. The programming language that, softly cursing, operates the whole apparatus.

And afterwards, question the interactive process critically: what steps did you take? Were you enticed? By what? What choices did you make?

And remember that the work functions as a mirror: more than anything, the interactive choices say something about you. They show how you act and interact with the technological world that surrounds you. • 33

Left: Eye Catcher (sketch) Lin Zhang and Ran Xie 12 See: https://nest.com/thermostat/meet-nest-thermostat/

13 https://medium.com/ @stephanierieger/ the-internet-of-thingsyou-inherit-or-leave-behindc3796506680ff1uu

Graceful degradation Kaweh Modiri

Graceful degradation Kaweh Modiri Cinekid's MediaLab is a playing field. Here, the makers on the frontlines of technological creation are producing visually spectacular artworks that react to sound, movement, light, air or touch.

You can cuddle with a tree, or marvel at a mysterious interactive projection screen in the form of a globe. New interactions continuously take place between the visitor and the work, creating a unique story. Yet there is a story behind the stories. That story is about the development of intelligent machines.

My thoughts on this subject, as well as my approach to such interactive art, cannot be viewed in isolation from my own work as a writer and filmmaker. I enjoy challenging my role as creator by adding elements over which I have little or no control. This sets up a relationship between authorship and chance, between control and irreversibility. I strive to articulate my human experience through my work, which becomes more accurate and more personal. The urgency to express myself stems from a feeling of human inadequacy; willing, but not able to do more.

My film Bodkin Ras,1 set in the Scottish town of Forres, makes use of both actors and documentary characters. One of these characters is Eddie, a local Scot who drinks away his days in the Eagle Bar. His sons both hung themselves at a young age. When we hear Eddie speak in interview form he talks about how he longs for change. The first step would be to stop drinking, but his desire remains abstract. We see him entering the same pub every morning, and he is drunk before noon.

In my eyes, the fact that Eddie does exactly what he doesn't want to do every day and is fully aware of it makes him very human. His story resonates with the abstract desires of the spectator because it's so recognisable. And despite the fact that everything we see points to the opposite, there is nevertheless hope. The film ends with the words: “I will try.”

Such paradoxes are not strange for humans.

We often want one thing, yet we do something else. We try although no one has said that we will succeed. And then try to heroify our failure and make it into a meaningful narrative, packaging it as a sign of our intransigence. And our failure is never a permanent failure, because hope always

glimmers on the horizon; if there is one thing that nobody can take away from us it is our hope.

Page 34: ANIMA iki Studio onformative

The glorification of impotence I participate fully in this paradox as a filmmaker and storyteller. I am convinced that regardless of our place in the whole, our human experiences are worthy of articulation. Why? Because we happen to be the only ones who undergo these unique experiences and are able to express and convey them to our contemporaries and future generations.

I have recently started to wonder if there might be 'more'. A human mission to further evolve into better beings with greater self-knowledge and capacity. Artificial Intelligence (AI) that ― unlike me ― doesn't need to hide behind the glorification of human inefficiency and impotence.

In his book Superintelligence, philosopher Nick Bostrom explains that humans are dominant due to their intelligence. Other animals have stronger claws or jaws, but humans have better brains. This has enabled us to develop language, technology and complex social structures. But, Bostrom asks, what if machines are built that are

Nick Verstand Left: Robot hands Stockphoto 1 See: bodkinras.com

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smarter than us? This new superintelligence would become very powerful. Just as the fate of the gorillas now depends more on us humans than on the gorillas themselves, human destiny would become dependent on this superintelligence.

How should we think about a world in which human interests no longer have the highest priority? Where technological progress and innovation would not be (primarily) at the service of humans? Would an AI that does not struggle between its inner world and its outer presence have the need to write novels? That is doubtful. Drama belongs to humans.

To think about an intelligence that is not characterised by failure is also to think about the end of our human narrative.

Keep running We are far from this point. The technology is still ours, and we control the playing field. The champagne will flow: the exhibition is open, as colourful and vibrant as fireworks.

The hair is curlier than usual. There is running, playing and building. I observe children who have been raised with love, and hope that they will not later push me off the roof. I make a note to my future self in a little notebook: There is no fort to defend. The surrender is complete. I am virtually present in many places; sensational impulses shoot through my brain. Existence is fragmented and abstract.

Keep running, keep breathing. Time can multiply infinitely in this inhuman orbit. Keep running. Sooner or later it will be there. It won't be long. Keep breathing. It will be heavenly.

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I stow away my notebook and begin my journey through the MediaLab. The first piece that strikes me is Treehugger, a project by the London-based design agency Marshmallow Laser Feast, commissioned by Cinekid, STRP, Southbank and Migrations. It is a Virtual Reality installation of a sequoia, a tree that can grow to enormous proportions.

The harder you hug the tree, the further you can penetrate its different layers to experience what is living and moving inside. The body is an essential part of this experience: if you don't touch anything, not much will happen. So not only do you see this work, you undergo it physically.

The creators say they want to bring people closer to nature with this piece. In their previous VR installation In the Eyes of the Animal, they also played with the human yearning for nature, with which most people come less and less often into contact. In this VR experience, the spectator looks through the eyes of a bird flying through the layered video scan of a forest, or is a snake crawling over leaves. Instead of VR goggles and separate earphones, Marshmallow Laser Feast created a large helmet so that the viewer is even more isolated from the real world and can fully merge with the experience of an animal in nature.

These artworks prove that the experience of nature can be simulated via technology. Treehugger is not a substitute for the original sequoia: in the VR version we can penetrate the different layers of the tree, something which is not possible with a real tree. Through the seclusion provided by VR goggles and headphones, the experience feels authentic and

Blogpost: The Warped Drama of Sunspring, Kaweh Modiri

Sunspring (2016) is a short sci-fi film written by artificial intelligence. The script and stage directions were created by a computer algorithm that was fed diverse sci-fi scripts and manuals From a production standpoint, this experiment by director Oscar Sharp could save an enormous amount of time and money. Instead of 'difficult' (read: slow and expensive) writers, simple computer systems could provide studios with scripts.

Hollywood may eventually decide to move in this direction, but for the time being developments are still in their infancy. That is fortunate, because I am firmly convinced that you cannot write drama if you don’t know what drama is. Even several millennia from now, artificial intelligence will still not be able to write drama better than humans. Drama belongs to people, and requires a dramatic consciousness.

You may wonder whether the cumbersome procedure behind the making of Sunspring yielded a result different from that of a five-year-old child with scissors cutting and pasting dialogues and directions from random scripts. Ultimately, neither has any real idea what they are creating. And this you experience clearly in Sunspring. The dialogue makes no sense, although if you try hard enough you may discover some poetic phrases.

But that is mainly because the actors (among them Thomas Middleditch, known from Silicon Valley) try to interpret and elucidate the script, as well as the addition of a standard film soundtrack. The stage directions also clearly lack professional expertise: “He is standing in the stars and sitting on the floor.” The visualisation of instructions like these sometimes creates interesting, unexpected images or contexts, evoking the absurdist texts of Eugène Ionesco or the cut-up technique of William S. Burroughs. But it remains arbitrary, and this cannot come as a surprise to the filmmakers.

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unique because you're the only one having it at that moment. We often associate this authenticity and seclusion with (being in) nature.

Like an animal Although Studio Toer's Fiet does not simulate nature, it moves as a living organism and reacts to the viewer. It hangs overhead like an animal and consists of many cones, the points of which move against each other and even split apart. It has sound sensors to catch changes in volume. Sudden noises make it shrink inwardly, as if scared. It breathes, moves organically and appears to relate to us emotionally. It is not only visual, but also a physical experience of the fading line between what lives and what does not.

I grab my notebook in a dimly-lit, secluded corner of the Factory Hall and ask myself what these works say about humans in the existential sense. Because it is not only machines that are programmed to mimic nature. Humans are programmed to embrace a new nature. It is the language that is being developed: a technological reproduction of nature that can evoke an experience and effect similar to ― and perhaps even extending further than ― 'real' nature.

As more and more data becomes available,

sensors become more sensitive, processors accelerate, and materials and mechanisms are improved and refined, an increasingly articulated vocabulary for this new nature is arising. We learn to read, understand, and accept her. And in turn, the machine learns to better analyse, predict and manipulate people.

Such an analysing manipulator also hangs in the MediaLab: Eye Catcher by Lin Zhang and Ran Xie is a mechanically-driven frame on the wall that reacts to eyes. The frame seeks the beholder's eyes and makes a face scan. Two spots then appear (as eyes) in the frame, and return the spectator's gaze. The frame sometimes moves along the wall with the viewer, reacting like a comic mirror (reminiscent of Peter Pan's struggle with his stubborn shadow). We see the rails on the reverse side of the wall. We know that there is a programme coordinating the object's movements. Still, the experience is magic due to the fact that there is an object that follows us and behaves unpredictably.

In turn, we can follow and study the object to figure out how it behaves. This mutual curiosity between two intelligence-driven entities is characteristic of the relationship between work and spectator in the MediaLab. We look at works that register us, react to us, and exhibit specific behaviours.

More stimuli

Page 38 and above:

Technological developments allow us to tell our stories in a different, more sophisticated way than was possible in the past. Evolutions in the industry focus mainly on viewer experience enhancement. Numerous developments, including VR, are still in their infancy. The film industry in particular is looking at developments that aim to make the illusion even stronger and the viewing experience even more all-embracing. It seems that we need more and more stimuli in order to be able to believe the illusion.

Not only must the nasty man before our eyes be repulsive in appearance, but we must also be able to smell him. We no longer want to look at a screen, we want to stand inside it. But watching a James Bond movie in VR is not the most astonishing development. The influence of the disappearance of the fourth wall (which preoccupied theater makers in the middle of the last century) and the projection techniques on the spectator's individual experience offer possibilities that are even more far-reaching.

Nick Verstand makes use of ones of these possibilities. His work ANIMA hanging in the MediaLab is a large sphere upon which pixels are projected from the inside. The pixels are

Treehugger Marshmallow Laser Feast

interactive: sound and image emerge in real time through interactions with the viewer. The original distance from screen to spectator is blurred.

ANIMA reacts to the audience with a variety of audio-visual communications, giving it the appearance of an autonomous object. The screen is no longer something we just sit and watch, but something we can now also walk around. The story is the relationship between humans and intelligent objects.

Curious objects The works in the MediaLab show us that we can enter into relationships with objects that are characterised by their behaviours, and which in turn show a curiosity about our behaviour. We learn a new language that emerges from experience.

It is unclear how long humans will remain the central factor in this experience. We can establish that AI is becoming more intelligent, and will surpass human intelligence in more and more areas. The pioneers of AI, according to Bostrom, have been so focused on the possibility of human level artificial intelligence, that they have barely contemplated greater than human level AI. I may still experience the physical mixing of humans and AI during my lifetime. And then, step by step, 43

there will be less and less human and more AI. Methinks that a new creature will emerge. The next evolutionary step.

But that does not mean we cannot play and experiment, and it does not relieve us of the necessity of examining our existence as human beings in relation to changing technology. On the contrary: the urgency is only greater. Rather than coming up with appropriate hairstyles and outfits for the AI that will administer our lethal injection, we can explore new areas with a spurt of inquisitiveness, develop new languages, and transfer our curiosity, playfulness and sensitivity to the next specimen. •

Above: ANIMA iki Studio onformative Nick Verstand

Toolbox filled with dreams Dirk Vis

Toolbox filled with dreams Dirk Vis ‘The artist that would practise his craft well must first sharpen his tools.’ (Confucius, Analects, 15:10) You can see how people organise their lives by the tools they use. The dreams of an artist can be seen in his or her toolbox. For an inconceivably long period of time there was nothing in the human toolbox but the axe, which launched the archaeological archive some two and a half million years ago.1 However new tools are being developed at an increasingly faster tempo, and it now feels like they just land in our laps. The axe is still something that my father taught me to handle, but something like virtual reality glasses are as new for me as they are for him. With each new tool we are able to experience something that could previously only be imagined.

The world outside our immediate surroundings largely comes to us via television and internet. How we organise our lives is strongly determined by apps and games: how we spend our time on the train, how we find our music, when we meet up with whom, how we find our way in the world.

We follow the patterns determined by multimedia giants and data barons. An unelected class of billionaires that own newspapers, television networks and social media channels direct the broad lines of our lives. We are encouraged to use our computers and phones to view content, to listen and to

Above:

read. Whoever creates something makes use of one of the numerous freely-available tools. But are there also artists who function within this media maelstrom and have simultaneously found ways to escape it? I'm looking for makers who with their games and apps show the luminous and pixelated reality for what it is: a dream.2 And is it true that they need to make their own tools to do this?

Cave painting Lascaux Caves Prof saxx via Wikimedia Commons 1 According to some scientists, the first words arose simultaneously with the first axes. Philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein said that words are primarily things used to get something done: thanking, cursing,

Lifelike wild animals

greeting, praying. In his 1953 Philosophical Investigations he wrote:

I am fascinated by artists who put energy into choosing and developing the right tool. For example, the cave artists thousands of years ago who were able to make their images of wild animals so lifelike only by viewing the three-dimensional surface of their cave as an instrument for their drawings.3 In their footsteps, painters from all centuries have spent time preparing, developing and inventing ways to make their pictures look more beautiful on canvas than in reality. You no longer need to make your own pigment nowadays; we take it for granted that it can be bought ready made. But in the twentieth century, one artist dreamt of paintings so intense that the canvases could only be enjoyed in person.

He invented a way to bring the gemstone lapis lazuli directly onto the canvas with a special adhesive compound.4 A photographer who wanted to see the moments between the moments built a camera that could record more frames per second than the human eye can see.5 For the first time,

“Think of the tools in a toolbox. The functions of words are as diverse as the functions of these objects.” Later in the text, Wittgenstein compared words to the levers in a steam locomotive. Today however I would prefer to compare them to the apps on your phone: they all do something different.

The pencil case is also expanding. I am typing the final version of this essay on a laptop, but I have already used the following, in chronological order: a pencil, a notebook, a smartphone, the Clear app, a Neo2 AlphaSmart, a printer, A4 paper, scissors, a fineliner pen, the full screen distraction-free Ulysses word processor and a series of blogs. Inspired by the works I describe later in this essay, I added a ‘twitterbot’ as my newest tool. Perfecting an adult twitterbot requires more work than I could carry out in the course of writing this essay, but some sentences are the first results of working with a bot.

2 This question came to me after reading the bright essay Echt zien (To

really see), published in 2011 as a booklet by author Bas Heijne. In his perspective, the novel enables to see the reality that is continuously

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photographs were able to move. He was able to visualise the phenomenon that at some point a galloping horse has all four legs off the ground.

In the most famous films, a special tool often plays an important role behind the scenes. One especially beautiful historical costume drama6 could only be filmed with a lens developed for NASA to look at the moon. This borrowed lens enabled the filmmaker to travel 300 years back in time and catch the light as it shone on the baroque interiors and costumes, for the first time without artificial light.

An artist who wanted to make images that surprised himself programmed a visual social network for other artists for that purpose.7 A game designer who wanted to take a closer look at the everyday experience of sitting at the computer built a 'mod', a modification of an existing game engine. Instead of a twist on the classic first-person 'shoot 'em up' game in which you as a player mainly shoot monsters, he built something essentially different. A game that plays with the buttons on your keyboard and with your expectations. A computer programme that makes you wonder if you're the boss of the buttons you press, or vice versa.8 A writer builds a chat programme and works what her users say to each other into her poems.9 A kid with a smartphone can now easily make a flying horse. Such a child may later build an app that shows a different worldview than that promoted by current app stores,

with their technological fixes and updates with little innovative content.10

presented to us on small and large screens in our cities, automobiles,

Entering an intermediate world

3 The Lascaux Caves are masterfully filmed by Werner Herzog in

Artists develop their own tools and realise their dreams.11 The latest addition to this list is the work of Daniël Ernst.

He makes widely acclaimed dioramas, virtual reality boxes that you can step inside. In an early work of his, Diorama #3, you find yourself in an abandoned toll guard house. You can walk up and down a bit, and exert minimal impact on the curtains with the VR controller, but that's about it. It might seem minimalistic, but you can feel with your entire body that it works, that you are experiencing something you've never experienced before. As soon as you put Ernst's headset on, you enter an intermediate world and you can do things you could not before, such as move through walls.12 Where others immediately make use of all of the possibilities, Ernst gives himself strict, specific restrictions: no endless virtual landscapes, but a single, carefully considered area. No repetitive creatures and inexhaustible weapons, but a precisely chosen number of objects and details. Ernst does not evoke a surreal world beyond ours, but shows you an alternative reality in our world.

"When you're done, you can shake your head to get out," he tells his visitors. Indeed, as if you're waking up from a dream. Ernst writes his own code in order to be able to work with the VR controller inside the virtual world of his crea-

his Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2010). He was one of the few able to

tions. He enters his own work in order to sculpt and draw inside. I believe that's crucial. Every square millimeter has passed through his fingers. It's not technological sensationalism; Ernst uses technique to make an even greater mystery tangible.

is incomprehensible. Such a thing is possible only with words.

offices and living rooms for what it is: an illusion.

make such sublime use of the newly-invented 3D film camera, and watching his film must be nearly as enchanting as actually entering the caves. Edwin Abbott Abbott also brought the third dimension to life in the novella Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions (1884).

Under the pseudonym A. Square, he wrote a story set in one-dimensional space. The narrator tries to explain the third dimension to the residents of the second dimension. Contemporary readers of the book can experience something of the scientific theory that there are eleven dimensions.

4 The colour Yves Klein Blue consists of the lapis lazuli gemstone and a chemical adhesive bonding. Even the most skeptical anti-modernist must admit that canvases with this colour emanate an extraordinary power: a force which can only be experienced in real life and not through images of the paintings in catalogues or magazines. The paintings of Yves Klein remind me of the story The

colour from space (1927) by science fiction writer and cult figure H. P. Lovecraft (what a name! really his name!). An alien object lands in a field, leaking a previously-unknown colour into the surrounding terrain. It is clever of Lovecraft to choose an unheard-of colour. He describes it too: pearly, yet different. You can see the colour before you and at the same time you can’t, because you know that the colour

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5 Stretching time, as photographer Eadweard Muybridge did, is a widely-used literary technique. A great example is the book The

Mezzanine (1988) by the American writer Nicholson Baker. This fullfledged novel describes only the period of a single lunch break. But

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A shining star at close range

there is no shortage of examples of the time stretching technique:

As I write this, Ernst is finishing his Diorama #4, a miniature virtual reality opera that people all over the world will be able to wonder at simultaneously. I've seen an early test, and the finished project will be part of the MediaLab. Putting on the headset is like taking a seat in a virtual theater. You're in a kind of retro-renaissance. This must be what's it's like to see a shining star that's normally light years away at close range. Daniël Ernst told me that he dreams of making eye contact with a supernova.13 Such a thing can only be accomplished by someone who takes his tools seriously.

That is the power of Ernst (“ernst” is Dutch for “earnest”).

Making your way through virtual spaces with Ernst's interfaces means experiencing something you've never experienced before. It's liberating. At the same time you experience how those same interfaces you use almost mindlessly all day long – including Internet browsers, phone games and menu items – structure your normal life. After having a mobile phone for a few years, you can no longer schedule an appointment without extensive back and forth messaging.

You learn the alphabet, and can then never look at letters

thick books that describe only one day or a single phone call for example. I have yet to come across a book that describes everything that happens in a single second, but that doesn’t mean that this book doesn’t exist.

6 Barry Lyndon (1975) by Stanley Kubrick. The formidable images in this film are reminiscent of the paintings by old masters. In language it is very easy to retrieve the past: which text does not begin with some quote from a long-deceased author?

7 The visual, social network is called http://delinear.info and was designed by visual artist Harm van den Dorpel in 2014.

8 Playing The Stanley Parable game (2011) by Davey Wreden is a bit like reading Italo Calvino’s novel If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler (1982), which introduces a character named The Reader. Calvino pulls the rug out from under your feet while you read. “I wanted to mess with the player’s head,” is the way Davey Wreden describes his similar goal. In

The Stanley Parable you become hyper aware of yourself: how you’re

again without reading them. The tool with which you work also works on you.

Paradoxically, makers who offer you other realities provide a view of the world as it is in all its mystery. The broader context within which a work is created determines what it will look like. The perfecting of the tool is already to a large extent the work. Those who want to show that what is usually presented as reality is in fact an illusion can invent new tools.

You can let loose your dreams in your toolbox. •

reading or pressing buttons. You wonder for a moment what is real and

story Le Passe-Muraille (1943) by the twentieth-century writer Mar-

what is not, and that feels empowering.

cel Aymé, in which the main character can walk through walls (which

9 This example does not yet exist in reality. It is a preliminary result

incidentally gives him more stress than benefit). Aymé’s stories have

made with the twitterbot mentioned in footnote 1: a programme in the

the same physical effect on me as the work of Daniël Ernst, where

design phase that searches live tweets and combines the results with

you sometimes feel more like a ghost than human.

a database of words in order to generate a series of new artists and their dream tools.

13 In - again - Italo Calvino’s short story collection Cosmi Comics (1965), the author casts supernovas, planets, interplanetary dust

10 Philosopher Matthew Crawford would definitely appreciate such

clouds and black holes with equally unpronounceable names in

an app. Crawford wrote the book The World Beyond your Head (2015),

leading roles as all-too-human characters.

in which he demonstrates – with amazing precision in just a few concrete examples and better than I can repeat here – how the interfaces

Page 44:

of most apps control the user’s position, gaze and expectations. This

Horse in Motion

happens completely unnoticed, and extends its influence beyond the

Eadweard Muybridge

smartphone.

Page 49: 11 One of my favorite not-yet-in-existence apps is the electronic de-

Relief éponge bleu sans titre

vice that Crawford Tillinghast in the story From Beyond (1920), again

Yves Klein

from H. P. Lovecraft, has developed: the Resonator. This device sends a resonant wave to your pineal gland so that you as a user are able to

Below:

perceive layers of existence that exist but are not part of ‘reality’. The

Installation

story ends in pure horror and shows that we should be happy that we

Der Grosse Gottlieb

can’t absorb everything with our senses just like that. At the same

Daniël Ernst

time it would not surprise me if someone presented an app in a dozen

Cinekid Festival 2015

years that visualises all of the dark matter floating through space.

12 In fact, Diorama #3 is a contemporary and hi-tech version of the

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Enter the Writers

Enter the writers Marijn van der Jagt (1963) is a dramaturg and art journalist. She writes reflections for Vrij Nederland on theatre, television, films and thrillers (for example for the annual Detective & Thriller Guide).

She also works in the theatre as a dramaturg and director.

She likes to slowly unravel and reveal stories and scenes, and believes that building suspense is just as important in theatre as in literary thrillers.

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Marian Cousijn (1987) is an art historian. She has a Masters degree as Museum Curator and works for the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, Upstream Gallery and De Correspondent among others. She currently is a curatorial fellow at the Tate Modern in London.

Marloeke van der Vlugt (1971) studied theatre at the University of Amsterdam, scenography at Goldsmith’s Academy in London, and choreography at the Laban Centre in London. She works as an independent artist and has developed interactive and performative installations.

At DasArts she specialised in the relationship between technology and performance art. She is a researcher and tutor at the Art Acamemy of Utrecht. Her book Performance as Interface | Interface as Performance was published in 2015.

Kaweh Modiri (1982) is a Dutch visual artist, filmmaker and writer of Iranian origin. In 2010 he graduated from the Image & Language department of the Gerrit Rietveld Academy. In April 2012 his debut novel Meneer Sadek en de Anderen (Mr. Sadek and Others) was published. His debut feature film Bodkin Ras had its world premiere at the Rotterdam International Film Festival in 2016 and was awarded the FIPRESCI international critics award.

Dirk Vis (1981) is a writer, editor of the literary magazine De Gids and teacher at de Koninklijke Academie van Beeldende Kunsten (the Dutch Royal Academy of Art). He studied Image & Language at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy, and design at the Sandberg Institute.

Vis has published essays, stories and ‘moving’ poems in publications including De Gids, De Groene Amsterdammer and De Correspondent.

Above: Cinekid Festival 2015

Colophon This publication is an initiative of Cinekid in co-operation with the Domein voor Kunstkritiek (Domain for Art Criticism). The associated blogs that served as inspiration for the essays can be found here: www.cinekid.nl/professional/enterthewriters/nl With thanks to Gawie Keyser, Katja Kwastek and Imar de Vries, masters workshops Enter the Writers.

Concept Paulien Dresscher and Siuli Ko

Photo editing Maartje Knepper Translation and corrections Ann Doherty Text Marian Cousijn, Paulien Dresscher, Marijn van der Jagt, Kaweh Modiri, Dirk Vis and Marloeke van der Vlugt Printer Printvisie

Development project, selection editorial team Sonja van der Valk

This publication has a print run of 500 copies.

Forthcoming December 2016: Unfold, a collection of the stories assembled before, during and after the Cinekid festival 2016. Unfold is developed and designed by the PublishingLab and covers amongst others Enter the Writers essays and blogposts. https://www.cinekid.nl/professional/unfold/en.

Project co-ordination Siuli Ko Editor-in-chief and copy editing Anna van Leeuwen Publication co-oordination Sonja van der Valk

© Authors and Cinekid, 2016 Design Janne van Hooff

Funding The project and publication were made possible with the financial support of the Mondriaan Fund and the Creative Industries Fund NL. Cinekid promotes the quality of creative technologies and visual culture for young people, and actively supports (emerging) makers, industries and networks. www.cinekid.nl Domein voor Kunstkritiek (Domain for Art Criticism) is committed to a critique of the future – as a driving force within the networks of media, training and cultural institutions that value a democratically conducted conversation about art and culture. www.domeinvoorkunstkritiek.nl PublishingLab is a laboratory with a hybrid attitude: conducting publishing experiments that mix diverse practices, skills, tools, methods and more. www.publishinglab.nl Enter the Writers, Cinekid MediaLab 2016 can be ordered from the Cinekid Foundation, info@cinekid.nl

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Image credits Cover, p. 1, 34, 42: ANIMA iki Studio onformative in collaboration with Nick Verstand p. 2: Process of Golem Juncheng Chen, Siyuan Jing and Lydia Zhou Interactive Architecture Lab p. 4: Super organism Anna Dumitriu & Alex May Commissioned by Cinekid Foundation Cinekid MediaLab 2014 p. 6, 9, 11, 38, 40: Treehugger Marshmallow Laser Feast VR technology

p. 8: Pokémon GO Photo: Willem Groeneveld Pokémon in de Folkinge Via: Sikkom p. 12: Caress of the Gaze Behnaz Farahi p. 14: Fiet Studio Toer p. 16: The Do Not Disturb function iPhone p. 18: The Do Not Disturb function iPhone display, Marian Cousijn p. 19: Nikon camera

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p. 21 Smartphone terror in front of the Mona Lisa in the Louvre Museum Copyright: illigraphie Via 123RF, Stockphoto p. 22: Faraday tent Sarah van Sonsbeeck Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij De Hallen, Haarlem 2013 p. 24, 26, 28, 30, 33: Eye Catcher Interactive Architecture Lab p. 29: Coffee machine Copyright: Marketingmanager.nu Flickr Creative Commons p. 36: Robot typing on conceptual keyboard Copyright: maxuser, Stockphoto

Page 44: Horse in Motion Eadweard Muybridge p. 46: Painting in Lascaux Caves Photo: Prof saxx Via: Wikimedia commons p. 49: Relief éponge bleu sans titre Yves Klein p. 51: Installation Der Grosse Gottlieb Daniël Ernst Cinekid Festival 2015 p. 52 Cinekid Festival 2015

MediaLab 2016

StoryFactory: Machines between Hardware and Technology not only determines how we and our children experience and shape the world; it also changes us. Technological possibilities are rich and varied, yet technology is simultaneously sometimes so transparent and invisible that its influence upon us goes unperceived.

Children play freely with new techniques in the MediaLab of Cinekid. The have no anxiety about clicking, pulling, tapping or shaking, even if they are blissfully unaware and simply exploring. The MediaLab offers this opportunity: for children to discover, and for adults to discover through the eyes of children. What can we learn from them? And they from us?

The theme of this year’s MediaLab is StoryFactory: Machines between hardware and software. Storytelling is timeless, but the means we use to tell stories change. And as a consequence, the way we experience and shape our world also changes. Virtual Reality gives rise to new cinematographic questions; the emerging Internet of Things surrounds us with networked objects; new materials and production models free us from factory standards; and new online tools and platforms lead us to interact differently with each other.

Writers Marijn van der Jagt Marian Cousijn Marloeke van der Vlugt Kaweh Modiri Dirk Vis

This publication invites the reader to reflect on technology in another way: the meaning of life? The meaning of things!

Celebrating 30years