Artist Entry 4/7/10

Mattia Casalegno is an Italian experimental artist who works with interactive environments and audio/visual artwork. Although he currently resides in Los Angeles, California, he works with a Rome -based new media crew, a project called Kinotec, which he co-founded. One of Kinotec's projects that I found particularly interesting was called "Unstable Empathy."



Unstable Empathy is an interactive piece of digital art involving two participants who have to interact. Kinotec has created a "reactive environment" which is stimulated by the participants in real time. However, the participants dont move or use a controller to alter the environment, the environment actually changes depending upon how emphatic the people are. This is a documentation of the initial reaction that a person has to another person: the immediated physiological response. The brain activity is measured by electrodes placed on the the participants' heads and depending on how stimulating their interactions are, the environment will change accordingly. This becomes even more interesting when the participants realize what is controlling the visual and audio changes that they experience. The resulting experience is what appears to be a complicated organization of spiraling lines which change in width and speed. You also hear an ambient blend of tones similar to that of a wind chime.

Overall, I beleive that Unstable Empathy is a thoughtful experiment playing with a combination of sound and visuals. It would be very entertaining to be a part of. One theme that is evident is
the theme of relationships. Although it is represented in a different way, the pictures and sounds changed based upon the relationship of the two poeple in the chairs. For example, two strangers would have different emotional exchanges than two best friends and the resulting trigger of the electrodes would change the art. Another concept that is being played with is the hand of the artist. Although the artist, the person who envisioned the artwork, is the person who is beig displayed, there is a collective consience of all three; the participants are also displaying their emotions as well.

My only qualm with this piece of art is the fact that the audience is so restricted. Watching the video with the sound accompanying it tends to just sound like a looping sound with a screen saver on. Why are the people who particpate not shot on film or recorded? Wouldn't it make sense to have the sound of the people with the visuals. Or maybe the sounds generated by the brain with the video of the participants. Overall though, I still think that it was a great concept to experiment with.