The Digital Art Show of GRAPHITE 2004, the ACM SIGGRAPH regional conference will be held in Crimson Hall, NTU Cultural Center, between June 15-18 2004. It will showcase 10 exciting, entertaining, thought-provoking interactive works, as well as a selection of two-dimensional prints made by 12 artists and art groups based in Singapore, South Korea, England, Australia, New Zealand and Spain. The curatorial theme of the exhibition is INTERFACES, referring broadly to contexts that mediate interaction and interactivity.

The theme for the Digital Art Show for Graphite 2004 is INTERFACES. The ‘interface’ has become one of the most important cultural tropes of recent times. An interface is a particular alignment of the functionalities and capacities of two or more relatively distinct entities so as to facilitate their functioning purposefully and as a (somewhat) singular entity. Such a notion of interface implies that these entities are separate and distinctly different prior to the interface and that they could become separate after it. In short, it is based upon certain presumptions about entities as such and the possibilities and limits of interaction between different entities. As a term, thus, it simultaneously evokes and frustrates questions of identity and difference insofar as the relationship enables the articulation of the differences between entities even as it forces the imperatives of identification. For example, the so-called human-machine interface is based on assumptions about what is ‘human’ and ‘machine’. However, much of the human-machine interfaces today are problematized by and exemplify discourses of the ‘post-human’, which posits that new technologies and cultural configurations demand that the conventional notions of the ‘human’ in contradistinction to other living things, machines and the environment be re-evaluated. Thus, it has been argued that the ‘post-human’ is characterized by a ‘human-machine interface’ where the hyphen that separates the human and machine is, at best, tenuous. The cyborg, that exemplifies this tenuous human-machine relationship of / in the post-human, has therefore not surprisingly gained extensive discursive currency in the science fictions, popular culture and theoretical deliberations of the last decade.

The interface also brings to the forefront the issue of translation since the success of an interface depends on the effective translation of the communication and interaction between the different entities involved. Interfaces involve the translation of behavioural and verbal cues, physical prompts, sensory data and affective dispositions into information that is readily comprehensible. The fidelity of such translations is often understood to positively correlate to the ease and efficacy of the interface. Some interfaces are therefore more successful than others by way of their translational fidelity. For example, in what is called a ‘natural interface’, the interactions of the human user with the machinic hardware and its operational capacities are said to be seamless. This is because the human user does not need to acquire any particular set of new skills and/or knowledge or act in manners that are beyond their everyday behavioural repertoire in interacting with the machine. The naturalness of the interface is in the way that the machine elicits, facilitates and responds to the interactions of the human user. In fact, the distinction between the ‘user’ and the ‘used’ as well as between the ‘interactive agent’ and the ‘object of interaction’ are thought to become blurred in natural interfaces.

While there has been much attention in recent times to the notion of interface in the scientific and research community, the role of the arts and design in investigating interfaces is seldom addressed. For example, there has been much discussion about human-machine interfaces and computer-human interaction in scientific literature but little has this literature acknowledged the role of the arts and design in ‘humanising’ these interfaces. As artists have always been concerned about how their works affect and engage those who encounter and interact with them, they have historically developed a rich range of skills and sensibilities that aid in the creation of interfaces. In fact, one could easily argue that art is an interface – an interface that is affective, speculative, ameliorative, seductive and progressive and productive. This exhibition seeks to showcase works that exemplify, exploit and explore the creative possibilities and limits of interfaces.

From Kyoto to Sheffield is a sound and image installation by Ernest Edmonds and Mark Fell where the mediation between sound and vision produces a unified work that integrates both – creating a single unified abstract structure is mapped into sound and image to produce the integrated ‘synaesthesic’ work.

Ernest Edmonds is an artist who has used digital technology since 1968 and is Research Professor and Director of the Creativity & Cognition Studios, University of Technology, Sydney.
http://www.ernestedmonds.com

Mark Fell's reputation as a sound artist was established with acclaimed records on Mille Plateaux (Frankfurt), Or (Touch) London, 12k (New York), He has run the Snd label (Sheffield) with Mat Steel since 1998.
http://www.forcedexposure.com/artists/snd.html

Transmit is an award winning interactive art-site that explores ‘shifting identity’ and creative culture in Aotearoa New Zealand. It thrives on physical presentations, and the intention is to enable users to activate the Transmit site, through screen and sound installation to allow audiences to experience the users journey, an equivalent of virtual spectators.

Transmit - creative technology collaboration, Sarah Hunter, Creative
Director, Oktobor Interactive, new media wizards and DJ MU, sound
production.
http://www.transmit.co.nz
http://www.okotobr.com
http://www.fatfreddysdrop.com

Noise Control and Fragile Balance are two 2D digital art works from Anna Ursyn. In her works the artist examines what technological and human worlds have in common. Natural order, revealed randomly and regularly, infuses several levels of both worlds: some determined by man, through buildings, their windows, even cars parked in lots, and some determined by nature, through trees, branches and leaves arranged.

Anna Ursyn is Professor at the Department of Visual Arts, University of Northern Colorado. She has participated in over 20 one-person shows and over 80 juried and invitational fine art exhibitions.

Sprung! by Brigit Costello and Alastair MacInnes is an interactive interface that plays with the physical weight of users. By jumping on and off coil springs, users create wind currents that blow soap bubbles around a screen space. Users must collaborate to create more bubbles and produce musical tones.

Brigit Costello
http://www.creativityandcognition.com
Brigid is a Sydney based interactive designer and programmer. She lectures in new media production in the School of Media and Communications at the University of New South Wales. She is also a member of the UTS based Creativity and Cognition Studios. Her interactive installation piece Erotecha was exhibited at Polar Circuit 2000 in Finland.

Alastair MacInnes
http://www.almacinnes.com
Al is a Melbourne based animator and sound designer. He studied science at university, instantly forgot about it and played music for ten years. Somewhere in there he remembered he loved drawing and came across animation. The discovery of Flash allowed him to happily combine these three interests. His 2003 musical Flash dancing game Funsters was a finalist at Bit-film festival, Hamburg, Senef Festival, Seoul and Animamundiweb Festival, Brazil.

Jin Wan Park (jinpark@cau.ac.kr) is teaching in the Graduate School of Advanced Imaging Science, Multimedia and Film Department, at Chung Ang University, South Korea, and prior to that offered “VR and Game Graphics” course in Pratt Institute, New York. His research in focused on real-time animation and game art.

PixelTouch is an interactive installation that seeks to question the illusion of transparency between the user and the object by creating a digital interface where the body of the object is the interface, thereby removing the need for a conceptual model. It is inspired by John Maeda’s conception of ‘pixel’, among other influences.

Lee Wee Na is an Interactive Media Designer at the School of Design, Nanyang Polytechnic. She has a Diploma in Digital Media Design from Nanyang Polytechnic.

Alex Mitchell is a lecturer at the School of Design, Nanyang Polytechnic, where he teaches and develops projects in interactive media and games. Before joining NYP, he worked as an Interaction Designer at IDEO Europe, designing and implementing interactive applications and installation works.

Ng Wen Lei is an Interactive Media Designer at the School of Design, Nanyang Polytechnic. She has a B.A. in Graphic Design from the Kent Institute of Art and Design.

Ayob Bin Ismail
"Impart knowlegde will never be enough at tertiary level but learning sharing among School of Design at Nanyang Polytechnic has becoming my forte. Creating dynamic forms and spaces has always challenge my new quest for understanding functions and motions. A great gaining interactive experiences and understanding each disciples with great respects."

Dr. Tie Gee Khiun
Lecturer SIT(Infocomm)
Lectures in Microprocessor Technology, Internet Technology & Multimedia Computer. Currently involve in grid computing project.

Ms Lee Kwai Peng
Lecturer SIT(Infocomm)
Lectures in Microprocessor Technology, XML Technology & Java Programming. Currently involve in grid computing project.

Muriwai04 is a game engine based art work that derives its inspiration from a special place in New Zealand (artist – Colin McCahon and Maori context), and serves as a site for a range of architectural follies that are encountered along the beachscape of that place. The audience is confronted with an infinite beach –scape populated by shadowy (AI) agents.

Jules Moloney is Lecturer in Design and Computing at the School of Architecture, University of Auckland, as well as Visiting Research Fellow at Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory, RMIT, Melbourne. The work is produced in collaboration with Rob Saunders, doctoral graduate of Sydney University.

Portrait was created at RMIT Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory, through rendering process from 3D laser scans of the faces – using tools more commonly used to digitize and imagine architectural forms. The result of this collision between precision equipment designed to capture static spatial information, and the moving body, is unpredictable. The scanner feeds the software paradoxical data, and the model fragments and comes apart.

Sophie Kahn was born in London in 1980, and studied Fine Art and Art History at Goldsmiths College, University of London. She has exhibited at public galleries and artist-run spaces in London and in Australia, and has work in private collections in Britain, Australia and the United States. Sophie works with new media, photography and sculpture, and is currently a studio artist at Gertrude Contemporary Art Spaces, Melbourne, Australia.