MEDIATED ENCOUNTERS

Ken Rinaldo: Mediated Encounters;
courtesy the artist

Ken Rinaldo taps into the co-evolution of organic and technological cultures.

Mediated Encounters is a work designed to allow two Siamese fighting fish to have a chance meeting by determining the movement of two robotic sculptures which hold their tanks. The fish determine both the speed and direction of the robotic arms, which spin on a centered axis. The fish control movement by crossing one of six sensors, which activate motors that move the tanks in either direction. The systems are designed to expand their vision around the room while simultaneously allowing them to cross paths as one robotic tank approaches the other. The sensors are placed to increase this likelihood, as once they spot each other through the glass, they continue to interact. Siamese fighting fish have excellent sight, giving them the ability to see far outside the tank

Siamese fighting fish are found in Thailand and the Malay peninsula, and are called by the Thailanders "pla kat," for biting or tearing fish. These fish are particularly aggressive in the presence of other males. When they observe another fish they flare their gills and swim aggressively, presumably to appear menacing and large. These fish have been selectively bred by humans to fight to the death, something fight organizers have been exploiting for years. This work allows these fish to interact without killing each other and to explore their environment beyond the limits of the tanks. This robotic interface functions as a kind of experiential lens. It allows the fish to interact while simultaneously alluding to our mediated world in which we use interfaces to expand our vision.

If we do not sense the mechanisms by which we communicate with an intelligent machine, and the system interface instead senses our presence, desires or needs (expanding and simultaneously collapsing our vision), then this interface can be thought of as transparent. Often, real/virtual system interactions are transparent to the user, be it a fish or a human being. Nonetheless, the kind of communication that the fish are permitted, both through their environment and through selective breeding, is limited. It functionally changes the nature of their interaction. This work serves as a metaphor for the kinds of mediated interactions that humans have on a daily basis, when using communication tools like computers, telephones and remote cameras to formulate notions of the world.

The continued development of micro-machines, biotechnology and computer systems in the co-creation of intelligent systems is increasingly collapsing the gap between the organic and inorganic world. While these systems will expand the spectrum of senses available to humans and sometimes to other animals, I wonder whether these expanded senses will be used with caution and individual awareness. Intelligent systems coupled with sense-extension lenses are becoming progressively more transparent, embedding themselves in deeper levels of our sensorium. Thus the perceptual distortions that may occur with these experiential lenses and expanded senses are becoming less and less evident.

Languages, as one form of lens or condenser of information, have been subject to far more aberrations in transmission, decoding and truth than the experiential lenses mentioned above. Languages have already created a complex ideational environment which far surpasses in complexity the electromagnetic spectrum. Through developments such as the Web we have become disembodied creatures, "mind children" as Hans Morovic says, with our experiences and senses distributed outward. Roy Ascott calls the web a "noetic network" in which the Web and our minds form a new space of consciousness. If we acknowledge the interdependent nature of all living systems while simultaneously satisfying the human need for expanded knowledge we will indeed become "mind children."

Kenneth Edmund Rinaldo [1, 2, 3] creates interactive multimedia works which examine the intersection of natural and technological systems. His works have been displayed and collected in the US and abroad at such shows as the Home Show in Seoul, Korea (1996), V2 Dutch Electronica Arts Festival in Rotterdam, Holland (1995), Image du Future in Montréal, Canada, (1992 & 1995) and Siggraph, Los Angeles (1994). He is Assistant Professor of Art and Technology at Ohio State University, Columbus.

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