MUTATIO 2024-06-14 14:38:22

This piece was generated during the exhibition of MUTATIO - Impossible to Control Just Contribute at the Digital Art Mile in Basel, June 2024.

MUTATIO - Impossible to Control Just Contribute is an interactive installation conceived by the iconic artist Analivia Cordeiro, one of the most important and active computer art pioneers, with a career spanning over 50 years of constant research and innovation.

The installation tracks and represents the movement of the participants' bodies, integrating them in abstract geometric tableaux. The audience plays an active role in the making of the final images - even if they can't control the process. The process of MUTATIO - Impossible to Control Just Contribute is composed of distinct phases, involving body motion capture and a combination of deep learning and javascript algorithms. The first step is the motion capture using a video camera; a neural network trained by Analivia Cordeiro and Nilton Lobo is able to identify the 24 joints of the human body through a pose estimation process. Nota-Anna, a software that has been developed by the duo since the early 80's, converts these captured points into a 3D body in space and a graphic representation to be visualized in different ways - shown on the first screen of the installation. Then, fragments of this graphic visualization are randomly selected every x seconds, and combined with a live generated geometric structure, to create the final tableaux - the output images are presented on the second screen of the installation, one after the other, as they are created.

Until this moment, the project has had four versions: MUTATIO I (2019, presented at Renault Garage, Paris); MUTATIO II (2021, presented at SP-Art Fair, Sao Paulo); MUTATIO III (2023, made specifically for the solo show at ZKM Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe); and MUTATIO IV (2024), presented at the Digital Art Mile in Basel by objkt. In each of the presentations, the project evolves and adapts itself to the new location and situation.

During the Digital Art Mile, the interactive installation generated over 5000 output images - one every 26 seconds, during the whole time of the exhibition. The majority of these images will remain in the personal collection of Cordeiro, while a selection of them will be curated by the artist in collections. A small selection of pieces, such as this one, will be minted individually as they have been reserved by some of the audience members interacting with the work.

This piece has been generated through the tracked movement of Ania Catherine, artist, choreographer and co-founder of Operator, in collaboration with Analivia Cordeiro, the artist and co-creator of the interactive installation.