Artist talk, Lighthouse, 3pm Saturday, 1st of August.
The Lighthouse residency for prototype 08 is about to begin. The Chameleon project is built over ten prototypes (2008-2010) with a cross disciplinary group of myself, social neuroscientist Chris Frith, emotion neuroscientist Hugo Critchley, Bruno Averbeck affective computer scientists Ros Picard and Rana El Kaliouby from the MIT medial Lab with help from Youssef Kashef, Abdelrahmen Mahmoud and Marwa Mahmoud from the American University Cairo, human computer interaction scientists Nadia Berthouze and her students Matt Iacobini, Kimberly Byers from the Human Computer Interaction Center, UCL and curator, Helen Sloan from SCAN.
The project investigates the scientific foundations of emotional contagion, drawing attention to how we innately and continuously synchronize with the facial expressions, voices and postures of others by unconsciously infecting each other with our emotions. It both follows and critiques the scientific methodology, creating scientific and artistic research, as well as new models to be used in scientific experiments, and new ways to experience art.
The Chameleon project interacts with its audience by displaying videos of emotional expression portraits, shot over the world by the artist. She asked volunteers to be filmed expressing emotions elicitng emotional states using varied psycho analytical techniques. The Audience’s emotions are monitored by facial emotion reading technology developed by the MIT media lab, driving a subtle interactivity of the work. The video engine, embedded with an emotional algorithm developed by neurocientists, pushes the work to empathize with the audience. Over time, it develops mood and temperament. For audiences, empathy becomes a powerful form of agency, becoming increasingly aware of and sensitive to the consequences of their interactions, becoming implicated into an emotional drama.
The Chameleon Project is funded by the Wellcome Trust Large Art Award, Arts Council England, Australia Arts Council, Lighthouse, in kind support from the Liminal Screen Co-Production at the Banff New Media Institute, Synapse Residency from the Australian Network for Art and Technology, Institute of Neurology at UCL, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, MIT media lab, Dana Center, SCAN and Lighthouse.
At Lighthouse we are investigating prototype 08 which explores a more sculptural iteration of the work. I am working with Natacha Roussel, Michael Roy, (Experientiae-Electricae). They will assist the development of a more sculptural experimentation for prototype 08 by reworking EE’s pixy screen to work with the Chameleon Project.
I am also working with Gordon Brand for the Solent University Rapid prototyping lab, Southampton, testing different projection srufaces, projectors and shapes.
Over the Lighthouse residency I will also be shooting more portraits, extending the video database of the Chameleon Project.
We will be holding evaluation sessions with the human computer interaction team.
