Abstract

This article presents research on assemblages among humans and computational systems in which physical and virtual autonomous processes occur in order to create artworks allowing the emergence of mixed sensory set-ups. It begins with triadic relationships computer, physical objects and participants aimed at co-relations among bands of bots (virtual and physical) with groups of humans (interactors). The bots have a representation of the virtual world: physical bots live on a flat surface (Abbot 1991), a projection of the 3D environment where the virtual bots live. The artwork also explores the metaphor of higher dimensions being understood through their projections in lower dimensions. Its goal is to weave interaction and autonomous processes, looking for poetic results integrating art, science and technology; results with aesthetic, poetic and functional qualities; and results exploring emergency and agency for design, construction and set-up of expressive systems. For these symbioses to happen the assemblage of environments with aesthetic and poetic appeal leads one to think about mixed cognitive processes that provoke emergent behaviours. I am interested in the behaviours emerged in such inter-relationships. Therefore, to achieve this goal, I have created a Java framework that allows me to program interfaces weaving such behaviors1 and also I have programmed a set of sketches using Processing2 to test the hypothesis. The main inquiries of such research are as follows: What kind of artwork could mix people with autonomous computational processes without becoming invasive? and Is such a dichotomy possible? To answer these questions, I came up with the idea of playing with swarms and flock algorithms mixing virtual and physical domains. Will this create the mixed behaviour I am looking for? Will the participants contribute with their actions, emotions and affects while the computer develops its own autonomous processes?