The Sonified Textiles within the Text(il)ura Performance: Cross-cultural Tangible Interfaces as Phenomenological Artifacts
(2022)
author(s): Paola Torres Núñez del Prado
published in: VIS - Nordic Journal for Artistic Research
This research is working with Sonified Textile Controllers. They can be described as textile sensor-based tangible interfaces. Some of them are part of a disruptive sound performance – an experimental sound art concert that has been presented in various cities in Europe and the Americas called "Text(il)ura"[1]. The three fiber-based controllers presented as part of this performance, The Shipibo Conibo-Style Textile, The Hanap Pacha Quipu, and the Unkuña of Noise, all reference the cultures of Paola Torres Nunez del Prado’s country of origin, Perú. These textile artifacts are works of art as well as devices that fall within the scope of smart textiles and that of human-computer interaction, as they allow the user to experiment with alternative ways of approaching the execution of sound art or electronic music. Referring to both aesthetically and symbolically distinct forms of expression from diverse human communities, these cross-cultural devices are characteristically hybrid and ever-changing: history, myth, craft and technology, gender, transhumanism, sound, visuals and tactility – everything is intertwined in an amalgamation of human knowledges and experiences aiming for a type of universality that does not impose one thought system over the other. The design of the interfaces proposes a different approach to tactile manipulation of electronic sound instruments, where it is common to find controllers made of metal or plastic, and where the aural and tactile sensitivity with which they are first made, transforms the performance itself. The Sonified Textiles aim to redefine musical interfaces, both conceptually and design-wise within the e-textile realm. The research uses a phenomenological framework to go beyond the mind-body dualism and to reconnect with the natural world.
