YMYI (2008)

(2008)

João Martinho Moura
Jorge Sousa

YMYI (You Move You Interact) is an interactive installation, where one is supposed to build up a body language dialogue with an artificial system so as to effectively achieve a synchronized performance between the real user´s body and the virtual object itself. The project aims at exploring a spatial sphere,where the user/performer is invited to develop his own creative inspiration based on his own body gestures and movements.

Reflecting on the concept present in YMYI, we realized that the user expectations on our installation were twofold – narrative and image. Underlying these concepts, that relate to us as Humans, and our perception of ourselves and the surrounding environment, we truly believe that the following definitions presented by the scientist António Damásio constituted a resourceful enlightenment. According to Damásio, on the one hand “the images (mental patterns) may be conscious or unconscious (…) The unconscious images are never directly accessible. The images access is to be provided in a single first person perspective ( my images, everyone´s images). On the other hand, the neural patterns are to be provided in a third person perspective. If I considered the possibility of observing my own neural patterns resorting to advanced technology, I would be always doing it in the third person perspective.” ( DAMÁSIO, 2000:362).

We have the pleasure of leaving you an excerpt of his book “The Feeling of What Happens”, which sums up the idealised proposal to the users of the YMYI artefact:

“It narrates a story, the story of a living organism unexpectedly astonished by performing its own change status while representing an object. However, what strikes the most is the fact that the knowing entity responsile for the act of astonishing is only created throughout the astonishment narration process.”

(Damásio: 2000: 202.)
(1) DAMÁSIO, ANTÓNIO R. (2000). The Feeling of What Happens. Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness.
A Harvest Book
Harcourt Inc.

Project page: http://ymyi.jmartinho.net