Final Project: Research
The first interactive project that came to me is actually not a visual art project. Instead, it’s a kind of street magic performance which is popular in some regions in China several years ago. Which is called “I can know what your last name is even though you don’t tell me”. The ‘magician’ will dress like a Taoist priest, which is similar to the alchemist in the western world. They will give you several cards, each of them has around thirty last names on it and they’ll ask you to tell whether your last name is there. After testing about 7 cards, they can actually calculate the last name using some knowledge about the binary system. The whole process is actually not that interesting, but with the mysterious appearance and words, the experience is quite appealing. Those magicians will add some ‘spells’ or do some gestures showing they are using ‘magic’ to attract customers and make the whole experience more ‘real’. Just as what Ernest Desmond said in his article ‘Art, Interaction and Engagement’:A significant part of art making, for me, is the development of an understanding of the forms and material being used. Those ‘magicians’ have a deep understanding on what their project is, they choose the best character the best language, gesture posture and clothes to perform it, that’s what really impressed me. The following picture is one of those ‘magicians’. The clothing make people’s first impression on him is something like a prophet.
Another interactive project is actually a series of projects. I saw them in different museums and exhibitions, they usually convert traditional Chinese art masterpieces like paintings or chinas into visualized interactive project, for example, the following example make some cattle in the traditional Chinese paintings into 3D version and make them moving and interacting with audiences. This reminds me that those so-called interactive projects needn’t to be totally original, making some of the art masterpieces interactive is also a great approach. As long as the way to adapt them fits their original character and the works do make them interactive instead of just making them moving, then these can also be interactive projects. Take this project as an example, the moving cattle are moving slowly and leisurely, their interaction also obey the same character, which is also the painter wanted to show when creating this masterpiece, in this case, the interaction project is a quite successful one.
Just as what I mentioned in the documentations of the previous two projects. The interaction should always consider the experience of the audience. To some extent, the aim of the project is to interact, so it needs to make the audience willing to interact and willing to keep on interacting, so all of those projects needs to make something to arouse and keep the audience’s interest, like the gestures language and clothes of a Taoist priest in the first interactive project, the audience or the participants find it interesting, then they will explore this more. I learnt this when I found the peers show more interest in the project involving Tom and Jerry in the mid-term user testing, then our rough maze, and I believe it’s one of the most important principles. Another point is of course creativity, I ‘m not saying the project should be totally original, but it should possess something really new, something that will make people feel like ‘wow, I have never thought about this’. The it’s successful , like the project made by Zach Lieberman, which uses sensors to capture eyesight to draw graffitis. That is more Tham creative, make the whole process a surprise and appealing. So being creative is also a key factor.
References
1. manamana.net
2.Ernest Desmond <Art, Interaction and Engagement>
3.baidu.com (searching for the first interactive project)
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