[-empyre-] Wearable Technologies and dresses/bodies in flux

[Johannes Birringer]

dear all

these last few postings opened up the discussion even more, thanks to you all,
starting with Michèle's  comments on neurological wiring and the relational exchanges
or interactions between organisms and environment, followed by the subsequent
elaborations by Susan Ryan on the subject of wearable technology and social dimensions,
and by Sarah Kettley on what is worn and made visible (to whom) and what is not made
visible  - in the latter case I was not entirely sure i understood what you were 
driving at (but you mentioned some research projects that i would have to look up
and there was no time yet) ---   were you suggesting there is a difference between
sharing and transmitting, and how does this concern the wearable or the wearer
or relational/interactional social effect? it won't concern the "wearable"  -  and here
i found indeed quite interesting all the cases that Susan mentioned of newly developed
applications in the fashion or fashion/sports industry that have not really caught on
or did not seem to interest people that much..

>>
there is still little interest on the part of a significant public in exploring wearable technology 
in the way they actually dress. I wonder about this. Why is wearable technology such an exclusive field?
 Perhaps most people have chosen to simply carry a single node—their mobile phone/personality central. 
When we are using our phones, I wonder, do we think we are invisible?
>>


the reference to Susan Kozel's work on mobile phones and social behavior made sense (here
indeed Erving Goffman's social anthropology is marvelous, I mention his writings on
"interaction rituals" a lot when we are building interactive environments that
invite audience to participate gesturally or movement wise with "digital objects"
or real objects that are connected into a computational interface scene - and ultimately
the participants in installations, as in other places and occasions that are 
linked to social ritual action, also always participate with each other, if there is more than one)  

 Kozel is very keen on developing the notion of social choreography; 
I recently heard her speak at a dance tech
workshop on technologies/social circulations at MIT (April 2011: http://web.mit.edu/slippage/dancetech/), 
where she descrribed a new project she is developing in Sweden, called "IntuiTweet", and it is an experiment with social networking
applications in improvised performance and communication (http://medea.mah.se/2010/10/intuitweet/).
She does work with mobile phones and twitter messaging (stimulating respondents to embody/enact a certain movement
or gesture or behave /respond a certain way and pass on to an other......);  
as I have also noticed more and more how these accessoires have affected people's way of moving
and being in the world;  just an hour ago I crossed a rather ugly parking lot near our science park, lost in thought;
and a young man walks towards me, and I note his warm, deeply loving smile, as he moves his lips
and looks at me, and  I'm about to embrace him though I don't know him; and then I realize he is talking to his lover, a string coming out of his ear, his phone was
invisible, in some pocket, as he carried some books in his hands and under the arm.  I try to feel embarrassed but actually don't, I just walk on and marvel,
feeling happy for him.

Not sure, though, whether the transmission devices are also 'statements' , and whether
the roles of the accessory change (>> the accessory has moved to become the key garment
instead of the peripheral object>>)

I suppose what you were arguing affects understandings of "dressing" or dress and the functions
clothes [or accessories] have in the social realms and milieus, and the issue of "control" over functions and visibility, indeed,
seems of considerable interest;  aesthetic performance (spectacle or less) has other concerns here, 
possibly, yet I was intrigued  by Susan's comments on fashion and anti-fashion
and on:

>>
and how we use garments to navigate a public domain and communicate a lot more than just our personalities. 
Dress may be one of the few creative things we all do on a daily basis, although its level of creativity is sometimes overlooked
>>


might you expand on this, and look at what creative ranges are used, in your opinion (or deliberately crossed out or
abused/non-used)? and how you see the issue of "control" of wearable image/identity/effect on others/affect? 
(Erin Manning in her Senselab in  Montréal held a lovely workshop a few years ago, i think it was called "TRANS-GENÈSE : CORPS-MILIEU"
// HOUSING THE BODY, DRESSING THE ENVIRONMENT......, and they used the verb 'emanate" in their announcements:
“what emanates from the body and what emanates from the architectural surround intermixes” [Arakawa&Gins],
but what exactly are these emanations, how do you describe them, in psychological/emotional terms, or in economic terms
or in terms of social relations that are virtually/tenuously or more deliberately and even profoundly stitched and cross-patched?

 Is this discussed [and by whom?, I don't see much debate in fashion theory, nor in dance or performance studies
of the new media arts contexts?) in terms of gender, age?  social class and tribe, in terms of race? and regarding sexually 
explicit or implicit styles , deviancy, perversion?  the body in flux (wondersome recent conference at Southampton:  http://www.solent.ac.uk/news/2011/thebodyinflux.aspx)?
the goth body?  and how mass media play across these categories now or how fashion/advertising/entertainment
in the late age of perverse capitalism is a rather chaotic mess, no?


regards

Johannes Birringer
dap-lab