The Virtual as Public Space and Stage to Perform Identity

Cyberspaces often include metadata in the form of meta-tags. Description and keywords meta tags are commonly used to describe the content within a web page. Search engines can use this data to help understand the content within a page that allows individuals to navigate in the vast ocean of the algorithmic architecture of the computed cognition. This type of new meta-navigation leaves traces of our bodies inside the cyberspace whose substance is bits, data, which are beyond the capacities of human cognition and perception to grasp.

The human brain, the body, and its parts become digital artifacts, informing the collective extra-spaces, shaping new digital species, rich in techno-spherical artifacts. These meta-models not only give meaning to digital objects but it also allows a new meta-navigation which enriches the steering abilities of users to navigate within the digital spatiotemporal experiences. How to interface and perform with these meta-artifacts and meta bodies in these extra-spaces? How to navigate in these spatiotemporal experiences? What is the experience of a virtual identity? Do we always have to bring back the knowledge to biological bodies?

This semester, we will collect digital artifacts to embody and perform in virtual public spaces. We will deal with virtual public spaces and stages to perform identity. Concentrating on exploring digital interventions on both the physical and the virtual realities using emerging, and free digital tools for artistic production, the seminar will provide a theoretical and practical overview and insight into the Virtual as Public Space and Stage to Perform Identity. Using low-budget 3D scanning/digital scanning/digital technologies to digitize the material world and combining different free tools to perform virtual interventions on spaces and bodies (AR / Face filters with SparkAR, webVR with Mozilla Hubs), participants will create Mixed Reality and online virtual experiences, reflecting on the semester’s topic and on new forms of exploring and experiencing the virtual while expanding social experiences by constructing virtual communities.