Discontinuity Machine
960 simulators are given a 30-second lifespan to interface the city and its other simulators; each simulator is added to the simulation one by one through a single device; the simulators can only communicate through physical gestures; the physical actions of each spawned simulator are recorded in time and space and are replayed in an indefinite 30-second loop. Here, the city is no longer augmented by the afflictions of digital space; it is, instead, a pure construction of the abstraction of the digital space that manifests as limits in respect to our pre-digital world. The experience forces the current simulator to relinquish authorship of the other simulators as they are already recorded in motion while giving authorship back to the simulator as they try–and almost definitely misunderstand–the narrative or interpretation of their limited communication abilities. The error of digital resolution here yields curious results and compromises, though what deeper afflictions arise if the medium is forced upon us in such a manner in stasis? What happens if we allow our cities, our social abilities, and our enjoyment of sensations to be degraded into such a belittling virtual complexity?
What does it say about our being if we need simulations to empathize with our own biology?
As you watch the captured video of the simulation, take note of the way stories unfold: as each lifespan is added sequentially to the simulation in accordance with the playback of the video, new stories begin to compose themselves as additional current lifespans become captured in space and time adjacent to already captured and looping lifespans.
Personal Project x SCI-Arc Rhetoric I / April 2024 / with Professor Marcelyn Gow
