Preliminary thoughts

During this week I began a journey through defining myself as an artist and designer , it’s been a thoughtful proccess because it led going back to analyze my creative process from the last years.

I think one of the most determinant factors with identifying myself as an engineer rather than an artist is because I’ve spent a lot of time working for other people ideas, and while it taught me a lot and also required me being creative and flexible in many fields, it also created an overwhelming feeling when I wanted to create something by myself. The first step was recognizing I really envisioned myself having a personal creative practice complementary to the work I can do for others.

One of the main influences in my work is very related to my actual job, inside the facilities of the exhibition space of Centro de Cultura Digital there is a room we call Memorial, I have a very special relationship with that place, because I’ve done a lot of field work inside of it,  programmed and produced concerts and exhibitions for a wide number of international artists. The room is very special for it’s technical capabilities as well as it’s limitiations which includes a 320-ish lamps RGB lighting system and an octophonic surround system and completely white colored.

This place has been highly influential for my working flow in many senses,

from the technical perspective it gave me a great white canvas for designing light pieces which were audio reactive, and also thinking on how spatialized sound can work as part of different narratives. Aesthetically it gave me a good intuition while working with light and color, as well as having a very minimal approach for designing inside spaces.

While I’ve never done a personal piece for this space I think most of them have at least some of my inspiration or curiosity. Thinking about all of this, doing my thesis as a project for that space was very appealing, but I think it will be healthy for my creativity trying something different, not a distannt or opposite because I think it’s fine my style is defined by it but definetely with a different approach.

Brainstorming

 

The initial brainstorming process for this project made me identify some of the concepts and aesthetics I want to explore, now I think there are many topics and concepts which interest me and maybe it wouldn’t be necessary to include everything, but it was a nice starting point for doing this work.

For my thesis project I want to explore 3 main topics:

  • Reactive spaces and architecture as an interface
  • Procedural sound generation
  • Cartography as means of visual and conceptual expression

Thinking about possible designs for adressing this questions I came across with the concept of Relational Architecture by mexican-canadian artist Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, I will be exploring more of those concepts for the development of my project.

Possible designs

Interactive sculpture

An interactive scultpure/interface which is an intervention to a certain space, it can be a gallery or a public space, it can be made from acrylic and have LED lighting inside of it. The idea which is not very developed right now it´s that it will react to some input which can be physical or digital and also have influence upon the space.

 

VR Experience

A connection between objects on the real world and a virtual space, moving objects at the space will influence what is happening on the virtual side, it can be a way to expand a space.

Interactive web experience

An interactive webpage which generates different topographies and musical composition, an exploration of narratives through design of fictional spaces