Abstract

Online presentation

Keywords: EEG, visual stimuli, Max/MSP, physical computing, interactive installation

Diffusion is an area of research exploring the interactive relationship between human consciousness and computational practice by analyzing human brain data from electroen-cephalogram (EEG)-based brain-computer interfaces and interactive devices that can generate music and synchronized visual images by biofeedback. Although interactive experience is not a new topic in computational art, it has provoked thought due to the significant influence of technology on human ideology, emotions, morality, ethics, etc. Diffusion is the result of attempts to establish a connection between human physiological information and digital technology. As well as experimental research, it’s based on the ethical level of artificial intelligence (AI). Diffusion uses music visualization to transform intangible brain activity (thoughts or emotions) into perceivable things (sounds or objects). The research emphasizes human consciousness in AI and points out the blurred boundaries between AI and human creativity. Therefore, the installation evaluates human motivation, which can present as abstract structures—like creativity, emotion, and insight—which enhance the interactive experience of participants and deconstructs the inherent meaning of the material and spiritual, reality and virtual reality or humans and machines. By reviewing and contextualizing EEG and digital music development research, we finally outline a future research area that will involve deep collaboration across interdisciplinary and multiple technologies to realize emotion recognition.

• Shuai Xu is a creative coder and a new media artist currently based in Hangzhou (China) & London (UK). Now Shuai Xu works at Alibaba as a UX designer, mainly focussing on Computational design, WebGL, and interactive installation etc. Since 2017 Shuai Xu works with computation as a medium and language to investigate the collisions between computational arts, science, and new media technology. As well as he tries working with emerging technologies that bridged the communication between traditional narrative language and computational language, focuses on this interaction relationship between immersive environment and intelligent digital system. shuaimxu.com
• Zhe Wang is currently engaged in art management research in Beijing (China). She got her BA in Central Academy of Fine Arts (Beijing) of Art History, then completed her studies with an MA in Arts Administration and Cultural Policy at Goldsmiths University of London. Since doing graduation project in 2019, Zhe began to focus on museum management and the narrative design of exhibitions. Starting from the aspects of curating, visual communication, digital integration and innovation of exhibitions, she studies the application of new media and technologies in narrative design, interaction and communication.

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