Schiphorst gives WEAR-ME!!! a keynote

There could be no doubting that the WEAR-ME!!! Network Exchange was fully under way when Thecla Schiphorst delivered a keynote address in the Norwich School Of Art And Design.

The world-renowned media artist and Associate Professor of Interactive Arts at Vancouver's Simon Fraser University is working on a commission for Future Physical entitled whisper, which will feature in the RESPOND Network Exchange in April 2003.

Schiphorst wowed the audience with a thought-provoking address entitled futuring {body, interface}. She explained the choice of title: "As a verb, futuring suggests that we process make and are constructing not only our bodies but our interfaces." Pondering what she said were two key questions relating to wearable computing -- "What is body?" and "What are devices?", she asked: "Do we wear our devices or do our devices wear us? Maybe both could be possible. I'd like to suggest our technology is a function of what we think our bodies are."

After discussing how technology can "Substitute our senses -- you can construct functionality in the brain, for example, with a chip, she touched on phenomenology, "The notion that we are interconnected with each other and the world."

Following with a discussion of the nature of devices, she closed with a brief look at her seminal installations, bodymaps and felt histories, and a tantalising glimpse of whisper: "The idea behind whisper is to build a set of garments that access a set of different experiential states singularly in the body and within a group of people." We can't wait to experience it ourselves.