The Remediation of Experience: A Case Study
Symposium:
Session Title:
- Theory and Criticism of Interactivity in Electronic Art
Presentation Title:
- The Remediation of Experience: A Case Study
Presenter(s):
Venue(s):
Abstract:
Since several years Art Historians and Restorers work on ways to document and mediate interactive moving image installations (e.g. Depocas, Ippolito & Jones 2003; Wijers 2007; Scholte & t’Hoen 2007; Jones & Muller 2008, 2010; Wolfensberger 2009; Kaye, Giannachi, Slater & Shanks 2010). By understanding documentation as a process of translation, the main challenges are translating the time- and process-based nature of these kind of art projects as well as interactivity and spatial components: These elements usually suffer from a loss within the translation process, especially if they are digitized e.g. for including a project into a digital archive. Up to now, the research focus in case studies dealing with time- and process-based art projects mainly strengthens the documentation and preservation of the physical and visual components of the installations, neglecting the aspect of experience for a long time. Only since a few years, attempts were made to capture the visitor’s individual experience (see e.g. Muller & Jones 2010). However, according to our knowledge, a translation of the visitor’s experience into a different dispositif was not yet undertaken.
Within our current case study we intend to close this ‘blind spot’ by experimenting with different ways of translating the experience of an installation. For the term of experience we follow the definition of ISO FDIS 9241-210 of user experience as “A person’s perceptions and responses that result from the use and/or anticipated use of a product, system or service“ (ISO FDIS 9241-210, 2009, cited in Bevan 2009, p. 1). Starting from the moving image installation set up in the real world, we want to develop a 3D environment and a (interpretative) 2D interface, taking the ‘ideal’ (as defined by the artist) and ‘real’ experience (by the visitor) into account. In a second step we will evaluate, in which way the experience of the environment and interface resembles or respectively differs from experiencing the ‘real’ installation. The case study aims to discuss the potentials and problems of translating the experience of moving image installations especially into a digital format. In our paper we will discuss the first results of this study.
