Abstract 

Keywords: Spatiality, Tactility, Proprioception, Multi-Screen Environments, Corporeal Cinematic Experiences, Interactive Art, Biofeedback

In this article I analyse performances, artworks and installations in audiovisual and contemporary art which emphasise tactile and corporeal experiences. This tendency can be observed in technological art, cinema and large visual attractions. I aim to demonstrate that due to technical developments and new tools, the possibilities now exist for new aesthetic experiences in which the body’s position and its biological reactions play a decisive role.

The Proprioceptive Experience in Art
This leads to the question of how the critical or theoretical point of view of an artwork changes when the spectator’s reactions to it are documented and quantified in real time and are changed into source material for the next stage(s) of the artwork. Does this constitute the next step in the research of interactive artworks which were based on the subjective analysis of the participant’s reactions? Does it require us to rewrite analyses of artworks which were based on the subjective judgements of the researchers?

• Raivo Kelomees, PhD (art history), artist, critic and new media researcher. Presently working as senior researcher at the Estonian Academy of Arts, Tallinn. He studied psychology, art history, and design at Tartu University and the Academy of Arts in Tallinn. He has published articles in the main Estonian cultural and art magazines and newspapers since 1985. His works include the book “Surrealism” (Kunst Publishers, 1993) and an article collection “Screen as a Membrane” (Tartu Art College proceedings, 2007), “Social Games in Art Space” (EAA, 2013). His Doctoral thesis was “Postmateriality in Art. Indeterministic Art Practices and Non-Material Art” (Dissertationes Academiae Artium Estoniae 3, 2009).

Full text (PDF) p. 492-501