How do we construct a cognitive and tactile experience of the seamless and near-abstract digital environment with it's analysis/construction/transformation included in the process? This thesis is an exploration reflecting sensual system experiences while providing a tool to translate and materialize information.

A childhood spent between the countryside of upstate New York and urban atmosphere of New York City propelled my creative exploration of the dichotomy between natural environments and urban landscapes, at the intersection of art and science. By exploring environmental systems (most commonly within the digital interaction space) I became interested in contextualizing the cultural relationships existing between sensory perception and technology. Artistically, I create projects that interpret the environment and critically challenge and translate accepted perceptions of visual and aural arts, technology, and nature.

Intersection of visual art, sound art, and technology.

General public.

This thesis project is a reactive sound installation.

Warning: This 'Garden' has a few "bugs."

Materials: Computer viruses, Speakers, Microphone, Visitors

‘Garden full of Energy’ is a reactive mulitsensory installation that processes the user generated information into visual and aural presentations. The metaphor of a garden is based on nature as a system of interconnected things where the growth potential of the garden is limited by the conditions of living. This garden is more than a garden of digital biology, a technology of artificial life, but a sound installation to converge the digital and physical facets of our being inspired by what I feel is cause of splits in them.

As installation this Garden is a system of elements as opposed to a project of individual objects. These elements at the sensorial level consist of microphones recording sounds in the space and speakers that output the processed sound; multiple screens depict visualizations based on this incoming sound data and its combination of sonification of custom encrypted computer viruses. These elements come together as installation through their placement in large grass beds.

As a reactive environment this garden grows and dies with user participation. Users are only aware of the process lurking behind the visualization when their contribution to the growth of the installation is signifigant; paralleling the digital and physical disconnection between the online and off data we contribute to the world in our everyday life.

By exploring this boundary as a state of “in-between-ness”: a bidirectional discourse of artistic mediums and digital information systems; as subjective and objective experiences, through formal elements of visual and aural arts, and physical properties of spatial design, this thesis was an exploration into what it means to work at the intersection of aural and visual art. Technically, it was about learning to dissect graphic notation systems and incorporate them into sound synthesis and instrument design. Conceptually an experience in the relationship between users and their data.