Dissertation Intent

Prototype Diaries

Bibliography

York University, School of the Arts, Media, Performance & Design
PhD in Digital Media/Computational Arts
Ilze Briede, ilzeb@yorku.ca
Supervisor: Prof. Mark-David Hosale
Committee members: Prof. Jane Tingley and Prof. Graham Wakefield.

Explorations of Emergence Between Human Brain Activity, Artistic Cybernetic System and a Spectator.

2024 - 2026

Humans have always been fascinated by the brain. In the 21st century, scientific and empirical brain studies have reached a new frontier thanks to technological advancements in tool creation, robust and exploratory computing methods using complex algorithms and machine learning, and discoveries in neuroscientific realms. As we learn more about the brain, we realise how complex and intricately rich it is regarding information processing. According to American computational neuroscientist Thomas Reardon, the amount of information coming out of the human brain dwarfs comparing to the amount of information entering the brain as sensory input data, creating a gap and opportunity to explore the potential for brain output. Fields of Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) and Brain-to-Brain Interface (BBI) designs are already addressing the challenge of brain output. However, the art sector has the potential to make significant and beneficial contributions that are different. Equipped with powerful and creative computational methodologies, artists collaborating with multi-disciplinary fields can produce infinite creative outcomes when materialising and exploring brain data. Moreover, the technological advances and affordability in accessing brain activity and obtaining rich and accurate data sources allow artists to work with brain output freely using a wide array of empirical and investigative methods, unrestricted by temporal or outcome-based conditions. This contrasts the more rigid and controlled guidelines in scientific and engineering disciplines, often directed by financial, commercial, and investment partnership goals.

My dissertation research contributes a novel way to engage with the human brain through experimental, performative and technological means. I propose a multiple-actor human-computer system consisting of a cybernetic algorithmic agent, a human brain and an active spectator/performer that co-constructs an experience and mutual reciprocity of each other through interactions and co-existence in performative space. The multi-angled mediation of each other's presence will encourage different behaviours and adaptability, thus expressing complex ways of relating. This research will contribute to the field of human-computer interaction and introduce new possibilities for artistic expression due to newly developed methodologies for creating computer systems in tandem with human brain activity. In addition, my dissertation will propose new visual ways to work with live data and give it alternative meaning outside of data visualisation incentives, adding to the field of distinct yet broad data art discipline.

Systems and algorithmic thinking

Holland, H. John. 1998. Emergence. From Chaos to Order. Reading, Massachusetts: Helix Books.

Hosale, Mark-David, Sana Murrani, and Alberto de Camp, eds. 2018. Worldmaking as Techné. Cambridge: Riverside Architecture Press.

Iuli, Cristina. “Information, Communication, Systems: Cybernetic Aesthetics in 1960s Cultures.” In The Transatlantic Sixties: Europe and the United States in the Counterculture Decade, edited by Grzegorz Kosc, Clara Juncker, Sharon Monteith, and Britta Waldschmidt-Nelson, 226–55. Transcript Verlag, 2013. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv1wxt2b.12.

Shanken A. Edward, ed. 2015. Systems. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press.

Whitelaw, Mitchell. 2006. Metacreation. Art and Artificial Life. Massachusetts: The MIT Press.

Schools of Cybernetic Fields

UK School of Cybernetics:

Ashby, W. Ross. 2015. An Introduction to Cybernetics. Eastford: Martino Fine Books. (A re-print of the 1956 original text).

Pask, Gordon. 1961. An approach to Cybernetics. Hutchinson: A Radius Book.

Pickering, Andrew. 2010. The Cybernetic Brain. Sketches from Another Future. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press.

Sloan, Kate. 2019. Art, Cybernetics and Pedagogy in Post-War Britain. New York and London: Routledge.

American School of Cybernetics:

Foerster, Heinz. 2003. Understanding Understanding: Essays on Cybernetics and Cognition. New York: Springer.

Hayles, N. Katherine. 1999. How We Became Post Human. Virtual Bodies in Cybernetics, Literature, and Informatics. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press.

Wiener, Norbert. 2013. Cybernetics of the Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine. Eastford: Martino Fine Books. (A re-print of the 1961 original text).

 Cybernetic art

Apter, Michael J. “Cybernetics and Art.” Leonardo 2, no. 3 (1969): 257–65. https://doi.org/10.2307/1572155.

Ascott, Roy. “The Cybernetic Stance: My Process and Purpose.” Leonardo 40, no. 2 (2007): 189–97.

Ascott, Roy. 2003. Telematic embrace: Visionary theories of art, technology, and consciousness. Edited by Edward A. Shanken. Berkley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.

Fernández, María. “Detached from HiStory: Jasia Reichardt and Cybernetic Serendipity.” Art Journal 67, no. 3 (2008): 6–23.

Ilfeld, Etan J. “Contemporary Art and Cybernetics: Waves of Cybernetic Discourse within Conceptual, Video and New Media Art.” Leonardo 45, no. 1 (2012): 57–63.

Reichart, Jasia. 1971. Cybernetics, Art and Ideas. London: Studio Vista London.

Reichart, Jasia. 1969. Cybernetic Serendipity. The Computer and the Arts. New York and Washington: Frederick A. Praeger, Inc., Publishers.

Visual, acoustic and kinetic artworks that utilise Brain EEG data

Ahmedien, Diaa Ahmed Mohamed. “Reactivating the Neural Dimension Role in Interactive Arts.” Leonardo 50, no. 2 (2017): 182–83.

Fedorova, Natalia. "The first neuroopera ‘Noor’: transparent brain and the end of humanistic ethics?." Russian Journal of Communication 9, no. 3 (2017): 310-314.

Gingrich, Oliver, Evgenia Emets, and Alain Renaud. "Transmission–Sonifying, Visualising and Analysing Neural Activity through Telepresence." In Electronic Visualisation and the Arts (EVA 2014). BCS Learning & Development, 2014.

Lucier, Alvin, and Arthur Margolin. “Conversation with Alvin Lucier.” Perspectives of New Music 20, no. 1/2 (1981): 50–58. https://doi.org/10.2307/942399.

Nijholt, Anton, ed. Brain Art: Brain-Computer Interfaces for Artistic Expression. Cham, Switzerland: Springer, 2019.

Pearlman, Ellen. “Brain Opera: Exploring Surveillance in 360-Degree Immersive Theatre.” PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art 39, no. 2 (2017): 79–85.

W. Joseph, Branden. “Biomusic.” Grey Room, no. 45 (2011): 128–50.

Wakefield, Graham, JoAnn Kuchera-Morin, Marcos Novak, Dan Overholt, Lance Putnam, John Thompson, Wesley Smith. 2008. “The AlloBrain: an Interactive Stereographic, 3D Audio Immersive Environment.” In Proceeding of the twenty-sixth annual SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems Association for Computing Machinery.

Neuroscience and brain data analysis

Fornito, Alex, Andrew Zalesky, and Edward Bullmore. 2016. Fundamentals of Brain Network Analysis. Cambridge, Massachusetts and London: Elsevier.

Humphries, Mark. 2021. The Spike. An Epic Journey Through the Brain in 2.1 Seconds. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press.

Marcus, Gary and Jeremy Freeman, eds. 2015. Essays by the World's Leading Neuroscientists. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press.

Sporns, Olaf. 2012. Discovering the Human Connectome. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press.

Human physiology and psychology

Cacioppo, T. John, Louis G. Tassinary, and Gary G. Berntson, eds. 2017. Handbook of Psychophysiology. Fourth Edition. Cambridge: University Press.

Damasio, Antonio. 2019. The Strange Order of Things. New York: Vintage Books.

Damasio, Antonio. 2005. Descartes' Error. Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain. New York: Penguin Books.

Haraway, Donna Jeanne. 2004. Crystals, Fabrics, and Fields: Metaphors That Shape Embryos. Berkeley, Calif: North Atlantic Books.

Radvansky, A. Gabriel. 2021. Human Memory. Fourth Edition. New York and London: Routledge.

Sherwood, Lauralee, Robert Kell, and Christopher Ward. 2013. Human Physiology. From Cells to Systems. Second Canadian Edition. Nelson Education Ltd.

Walter, William Grey. 1961. The Living Brain. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books.