[ISEA2015] Paper: Oliver Bown, Lian Loke, Sam Ferguson & Dagmar Reinhardt — Distributed Interactive Audio Devices: Creative strategies and audience responses to novel musical interaction scenarios

Abstract (Short paper)

Keywords: Internet of Things, Spatial Audio, Sensor Network User Interfaces, Sonic Art.

With the rise of ubiquitous computing, comes new possibilities for experiencing audio, visual and tactile media in distributed and situated forms, disrupting modes of media experience that have been relatively stable for decades. We present the Distributed Interactive Audio Devices (DIADs) project, a set of experimental interventions to explore future ubiquitous computing design spaces in which electronic sound is presented as distributed, interactive and portable. The DIAD system is intended for creative sound and music performance and interaction, yet it does not conform to traditional concepts of musical performance, suggesting instead a fusion of music performance and other forms of collaborative digital interaction. We describe the thinking behind the project, the state of the DIAD system’s technical development, and our experiences working with userinteraction in lab-based and public performance scenarios.

  • Oliver Bown, Senior Lecturer, UNSW Faculty of Art & Design, Interactive Media Lab, Sydney, Australia. I am a researcher and maker working with creative technologies. I come from a highly diverse academic background spanning social anthropology, evolutionary and adaptive systems, music informatics and interaction design, with a parallel career in electronic music and digital art spanning over 15 years. I am interested in how artists, designers and musicians can use advanced computing technologies to produce complex creative works. My current active research areas include media multiplicites, musical metacreation, the theories and methodologies of computational creativity, new interfaces for musical expression, and multi-agent models of social creativity. Following a bachelors in mathematics and social anthropology at the University of Cambridge and a masters in evolutionary and adaptive systems at the University of Sussex, I undertook a PhD looking at simulation models of the evolution of human musical behaviour at the Intelligent Sound and Music Systems group, Goldsmiths College, London, under the supervision of Professor Geraint Wiggins. In 2008 I moved to Melbourne, Australia, to work as postdoctoral research assistant with Jon McCormack at Monash University, working on an ARC Discovery Project that looked at ecosystemic approaches to digital creativity. Then in 2011 I took a lectureship at the Design Lab at the University of Sydney, where I am currently on a postdoctoral fellowship. During this time I have played in a number of improvied music ensembles, most notably my electronic music duo Icarus (with Sam Britton), the Not Applicable Artists Collective (with Sam Britton, Tom Arthurs, Lothar Olhmeier, Maurizio Ravalico, Britt Hatzius, Martin Hampton, Rudi Fischerlehner and Oliver Dukert), and Tangents (with Peter Hollo, Adrian Lim-Klumpes, Shoeb Ahmad and Evan Dorrian). I am also a collaborating member of the digital interactive art group Squidsoup, and have collaborated with many artsits, musicians and designers on digital interactive artworks. I am a founding member of the Musical Metacreation Research Network, a member of the steering committee for the International Conference on Computational Creativity, and a creative advisor to the University of Sydney Vivid Festival. I have performed, composed and created interactive works in a number of countries, contexts and collaborations, such as… Sonic Acts Festival Amsterdam, Vivid Sydney, AudioVisiva Milan, Bimhuis Amsterdam, Scala London, Oslo Lux, Kinetica Art Fair, Powerhouse Sydney, ISEA, Four Tet (remix), Murcof (remix), The Leaf Label, Output Recordings, Cafe Oto, Adem Ilhan (duo), Futuresonic, Dysfunktional Beats, The NOW Now, Eclectic Method feat. Chuck D (remix), ABC New Music Up Late, ABC Sound Quality, Codame Festival San Francisco, ABC Catalyst, Science Museum London, FBi Ears Have Ears, Weirdcore, Shepherds Bush Empire London, The Monastery of Sound, JazzHouse Copenhagen, Norburg Festival Sweden, Rump Recordings, Jazzjuice Festival Aarhus, ISEA, HellosQuare, Sage Gateshead, North Sea Jazz Festival, King’s Place London, Brussels Planetarium, The Wire Magazine, BBC Mixing It, BBC Late Junction, Shunt London, Cube Cinema Bristol, Temporary Residence, Siouxie Sioux (remix), Sonic Arts Network Expo, Ars Electronica, Transmediale Festival, Cave12 Geneva, Caribou (remix), Aphex Twin (software development), Lux Cinema London, PRS Foundation for New Music, STEIM Amsterdam, Sage Gateshead, xCoAx, Dispatch Festival Belgrade, Seymour Centre, Australia Council, British Council.
  • Lian Loke pursues an interdisciplinary creative practice across performance, installation and technology, with the body as a constant theme. She is a Senior Lecturer in the Design Lab, Faculty of Architecture, Design and Planning, University of Sydney, Australia, and co-founder of the Pork Collective, a group of artists working in performance installation in festival environments. Recent projects investigating creative agency and bodily experience in technology-mediated contexts include Distributed Choreographies and Sensate Machines with Dagmar Reinhardt, a 2012 Critical Path residency for the My Mind Y/Our Body project with Michaela Davies, and 2010 Australia Council Inter-Arts Project grant for Luscious Apparatus.  lianloke.com
  • Dagmar Reinhardt leads the Master of Digital Architecture Research at the Faculty of Architecture, Design and Planning, The University of Sydney, Australia. She is also an architect and practice director of reinhardtjung (reinhardtjung.de), a research-led, international design and architecture practice based in Sydney and Frankfurt. Dagmar lectures at European and Australian Universities on research, design, industry collaborations and architecture. reinhardtjung develops architecture through buildings, installations, curatorial work and research. Their work has been widely published and received numerous nominations and awards. With the biome research group, Reinhardt explores the intersections between evolution, design, mathematics, architecture and music.
  • Sam Ferguson, Creativity and Cognition Studios, University of Technology, Sydney, NSW, Australia

Full text (PDF) p. 604-607