Metaphone: machine aesthetics meets interaction design

Through our art project, Metaphone, we explored a particular form of aesthetics referred to in the arts tradition as machine aesthetics. The Metaphone machine collects the participant's bio-data, Galvanic Skin Response (GSR) and Heart Rate (HR), creating a process of movement, painting and sound. The machine behaves in machine-like, aesthetically evocative ways: a shaft on two large wheels rotates on the floor, carrying paint that is dripped onto a large sheet of aquarelle paper on the floor according to bio-sensor data. A soundscape rhythmically follows the bio-sensor data, but also has its own machine-like sounds. Six commentators were invited to interact with the machine. They reported a strangely relaxing atmosphere induced by the machine. Based on these experiences we discuss how different art styles can help to describe aesthetics in interaction design generally, and how machine aesthetics in particular can be used to create interesting, sustained, stylistically coherent interactions.

[1]  Kristina Höök,et al.  Sense and sensibility: evaluation and interactive art , 2003, CHI '03.

[2]  Danielle Wilde,et al.  hipDisk: Using sound to encourage physical extension, exploring humour in interface design , 2008 .

[3]  Sara Ilstedt Hjelm,et al.  Research + design: the making of Brainball , 2003, INTR.

[4]  Maria Gough,et al.  The Artist as Producer: Russian Constructivism in Revolution , 2005 .

[5]  Paul Brown.  White heat cold logic : British computer art 1960-1980 , 2008 .

[6]  Steve Benford,et al.  Ambiguity as a resource for design , 2003, CHI '03.

[7]  George Poonkhin Khut,et al.  Development and evaluation of participant-centred biofeedback artworks , 2006 .

[8]  Jin Moen.  KinAesthetic Movement Interaction : Designing for the Pleasure of Motion , 2006 .

[9]  Kristina Höök,et al.  Metaphone: an artistic exploration of biofeedback and machine aesthetics , 2013, CHI Extended Abstracts.

[10]  Sara Ilstedt Hjelm.  The making of Brainball , 2003 .

[11]  R.I.A. Mercuri,et al.  Technology as Experience , 2005, IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication.

[12]  Joe Marshall,et al.  Uncomfortable interactions , 2012, CHI.

[13]  Jonas Löwgren,et al.  Annotated portfolios and other forms of intermediate-level knowledge , 2013, INTR.

[14]  Kristina Höök,et al.  Strong concepts: Intermediate-level knowledge in interaction design research , 2012, TCHI.

[15]  Shaowen Bardzell,et al.  Touch style: creativity in tangible experience design , 2013, Creativity & Cognition.

[16]  Y. Rogers,et al.  Interaction Design , 2002 .

[17]  E. Vesterinen,et al.  Affective Computing , 2009, Encyclopedia of Biometrics.

[18]  Christine Poggi,et al.  Futurism : an anthology , 2009 .

[19]  Phoebe Sengers,et al.  Making by making strange: Defamiliarization and the design of domestic technologies , 2005, TCHI.

[20]  Michael Mateas,et al.  Expressive AI: A Hybrid Art and Science Practice , 2001, Leonardo.

[21]  JOHN F. Young.  Machine Intelligence , 1971, Nature.

[22]  Celine Latulipe,et al.  Love, hate, arousal and engagement: exploring audience responses to performing arts , 2011, CHI.

[23]  Kristina Höök,et al.  Rudiments 1, 2 & 3: design speculations on autonomy , 2010, TEI.

[24]  Ulf Hagen,et al.  Lodestars for Player Experience : Ideation in Videogame design , 2012 .

[25]  Erik Stolterman,et al.  The Nature of Design Practice and Implications for Interaction Design Research , 2008 .

[26]  E. Grosz.  Volatile Bodies: Toward a Corporeal Feminism , 1994 .

[27]  Kirsten Boehner.  Opening the Frame of the Art Museum : Technology between Art and Tool , 2005 .

[28]  William W. Gaver.  Cultural commentators: Non-native interpretations as resources for polyphonic assessment , 2007, Int. J. Hum. Comput. Stud..

[29]  Erik Stolterman,et al.  Interaction gestalt and the design of aesthetic interactions , 2007, DPPI.

[30]  Daniel Fallman,et al.  The new good: exploring the potential of philosophy of technology to contribute to human-computer interaction , 2011, CHI.

[31]  Thecla Schiphorst,et al.  soft(n): toward a somaesthetics of touch , 2009, CHI Extended Abstracts.