The aesthetics of intermedial interactivity

Scott, JE

Abstract

This paper places Gareth White’s (2013) theories around the ‘aesthetics’ of participation in relation to an interactive intermedial space in order to propose the distinct ‘aesthetics of intermedial interactivity’. White’s definition of ‘participation’ as that ‘of an audience…in the action of a performance’ (4) is linked to Steve Dixon’s (2007) theories around interactivity in digital performance, where he highlights the ‘ability of the user’ to ‘activate, affect, play with, input into, build, or entirely change it’ (561). This results in a question as to the particular ‘aesthetics’ of this interactive encounter within and through media.

Working from my experiences as a live media practitioner, I use examples from this work, to explore the distinct nature of intermedial interactivity in live media practices, where the elements of the intermedial space are activated in real time and ‘on the fly’ (Cooke 2010). I characterise the intermediality generated through such practices as a ‘lively discourse’, which involves a series of actions and interactions between the different elements in play, including the performer, ‘experiencers’ (Nelson 2010), audio-visual space generated and the ‘technical mediums’ (Elleström 2010) which are used to create that space.

Finally, an aesthetic is proposed that accounts for the displaced and dislocated, yet intensely haptic space which is generated between ‘experiencers’ in live media events; what Cooke describes as ‘a new kind of perceptual sense’ (2010: 195) and Susan Kozel (2007) characterises as ‘a fluid play of degrees of materiality’ (125). In response to White’s focus on ‘the way the audience member herself or himself becomes the artist’s medium, and so the work’s aesthetic material’ (White 2013: 10), this paper proposes that the aesthetics of intermedial interactivity lie in vectors of doing – actions and interactions, which shift and reconfigure both the intermedial space and the event which is formed through such actions.

Citation

Scott, J. The aesthetics of intermedial interactivity. Presented at International Society for Intermedial Studies Conference #2, Utrecht University

• Presentation Conference Type: Other
• Conference Name: International Society for Intermedial Studies Conference #2
• Conference Location: Utrecht University
• End Date: Apr 18, 2015
• Deposit Date: Jun 12, 2015
• Related Public URLs: http://isis2015.nl
• Additional Information: Event Type : Conference