Announcement for the exhibition - solo show "Rythmicaliness", The House of Youth, Belgrade, Serbia, 2023.
Background / process
The project was realized with the help of a startup company from the SexTech industry that develops smart vibrator devices. For research purposes, they monitored the masturbation sessions of vibrator users in order to improve the product. Inspired by the data they collected for this purpose, I converted them from numerical format to audio and visual graphics using processing technologies.
Right: Some of the data collected by capturing the various parameters - temperature, position, motor strength, etc. Left: Data translation from raw data to visual scheme
Musical album
The album consists of 7 songs generated from data collected through monitoring sessions of masturbation from several volunteers. Using data processing and design technologies, parameters such as body temperature, pressure intensity, and vibrator device position were converted into a musical notation system. Each song is composed from one session and accompanied by a graphic visualization that draws the parameters from the dataset in real-time, synchronized with the sound frequency, adding a synesthetic dimension to it. In this way, a unique interface was created, enabling these multimedia recordings to establish a symbolic dialogue between the subjective and collective realms of a fundamental sphere of human experience. The album is available on YouTube and Spotify platforms.
Album on Spotify and official cover
Album song "Arcane" on YouTube
Sound design
By a detailed analysis of 56 data sets, I noticed similarities between the average music track and the session. In both cases, the values of the data grow dynamically and decrease within a certain time interval, creating a kind of rhythm. The values of the collected data, such as body temperature, engine power, position and pressure of the vibrator device, were converted into a music system. Depending on the dynamics of the change of these values, each column in the table is translated into an appropriate instrument whose role within the music track is similar to the role of a data group in the entire data set.
For the needs of this project, I created a special software solution for translating the collected data from the numerical format into audio and visual graphics.
Some of the data that was collected by capturing various parameters
Design of moving visuals
The color of the pulsating graphic shape is generated using the force (fc) and temperature (C) values. As these values increase over time, the hue and saturation of the color also increase. A dynamic progression from cold and less lively tones to warmer, more vivid tones creates the effect of impending tension.
The intention was to convey an abstract and natural form. Each line has its previous state 'remembered', some time after it leaves the position, which creates the effect of the shape leaving the 'stamp'.
Each dataset creates a characteristic, different shape for each session.
Posters
Each audio track is visually represented by a distinct poster. By transferring visual images from the digital realm, the transgressive experience takes another step further - it is rematerialized and brought back into the physical world through the translation performed by the machine. Each drawing consists of a visual model and textual information about the data that defines it at the moment of drawing, such as device pressure force, spatial coordinates of the vector shape, and so on.
X,Y plotter prints, pencils on paper, 50x70cm, (detail), 2023.
By materializing the intimate and translating it into the binary system, a range of topics for examination is opened, such as the embodiment of emotions and cyborgization through technological intervention that affects the experience of sexuality and how we connect with our bodies and others. 'Rhythmicaliness' also symbolically and ironically mimics the mechanism of scientific determination of highly abstract concepts such as erotic pleasure, critically engaging with the concept of disciplining the body through scientific rationalizations.
The posters are created using a custom designed for this purpose CNC Router Drawing Robot.
X,Y plotter prints, pencils on paper, 50x70cm, 2023.