Christa Sommerer and Laurent Mignonneau Art as a Living System 1998

"In the environment, the participant is confronted with a completely new kind of experience. He is stripped of his informed expectations and forced to deal with the moment in its own terms. He is actively involved, discovering that his limbs have been given new meaning and that he can express himself in new ways. He does not simply admire the work of the artist; he shares in its creation."

Myron W Krueger Responsive Environments 1977

Summary
Interactivity has become a major consideration in the development of a contemporary art practice that engages with the proliferation of computer-based technologies.

Computer-based technologies have created a revolution in the field of sound art and music composition. The computer has opened up a whole new genre where primary composition material can be drawn from any vibrating source, and once digitised, becomes a fluid and viscous medium in the hands of a skilled composer.

Garth Paine's interest lies in placing the exploration of the potential of these technologies within an organic and human framework. His installation work has focused on creating immersive environments that respond to the movement and behavior patterns detected within them. The body becomes the controller. The organic process of human exploration, cognition and response, becomes the central influence in defining the output of the interactive process.

In order to make the experience of an interactive environment as immediate as possible, Garth Paine has been developing approaches to the creation of interactive installations that goes beyond the simple triggering of pre-defined audio and video clips, towards the generation of the material in real time, based on inputs from the user(s).

Garth Paine's previous works, MAP1 (exhibited at Span Galleries, Melbourne 1998: Victoria University, Wellington NZ 1999: Musical Instrument Museum, Berlin 1999 : Art Space, Sydney 2000) and MAP2(exhibited at the Musical Instrument Museum, Berlin 1999/2000), and Gestation (2001) successfully achieved the development of sound in real time, derived from the sounds and controlled by the movement of people within the installation.

His research and development work, undertaken while the Australia Council for the Arts, New Media Arts Fellow at RMIT University in 2000 explored the use of a Neural Network, ( an approach to computing that constructs a data processing matrix modeled on the human brain, which has the ability to learn patterns and therefore to evolve according to conditioning), to deliver much more flexible and sophisticated data extraction from sensed movement and behavior patterns than is currently possible. In addition, the Neural Network approach has been used to explore the possibilities for selecting response parameters associated with individuals, recognising the individual, and associating particular sound and video generation algorithms with that individual when they perform that specific activity.

The Neural Network learns from data input and evolves accordingly. This means that future immersive installations will observe and learn about the human behavior traits within them, and evolve during the exhibition period. The installation will in this way grow and mature during the time of its gallery exhibition to produce responses conditioned by an historical understanding of the current observed behavior within the learned patterns. It will adapt to the site, and the human response to the site and the installation! This will be a world first in this application of Artificial Intelligence computing to immersive environment art installations.

The ability to track individuals through space, and attach real time sound and video generation algorithms to those individuals, affords the interactive environments of Garth Paine considerable sophistication. The application of real time synthesis in preference to pre-recorded finite soundbites means that the installations of Garth Paine are infinitely variable and responsive to a broad range of human behavior. Information and short video excerpts of Garth Paine’s previous installation works, MAP1 and MAP2 are available at the following Web site: http://www.activatedspace.com/installations

for exhibition equipment requirements see : http://www.activatedspace.com/installations/