Hacking the Body 2.0 performance

The current technology fervour over wearable technology that collects user’s intimate body data, under the pretence of medical or fitness monitoring, highlights that it is time that critical questions were raised. The ethics of corporate ownership of body data for consumerist agendas is rarely discussed beyond the fine print on these devices. More awareness and education on these issues, would potentially allow more access, ownership, and creativity in the use of one's own body data, and ways to express personal identity through this data. This project questions how body data may be able to demonstrate who we are, through movement, through our physiology. How might access to personal data enable the performer to show their identity, rather than what is subscribed by the corporation making the sensing device? How might we explore these issues while enabling people access to their own data, especially in performance contexts, in order to interact with it? We recently staged 2 performances of the 2 pieces developed for this stage of the project in London, UK (February 16th) and in Sheffield, UK (February 18th) – the first piece: 1) flutter/stutter – haptic costumes with 'tickle motor' actuation and custom vibe actuators, with sound feedback for the audience linked to the touch interaction; and 2) feel me – costumes with a mix of hacked off-the-shelf wearable tech garments with breath and heartrate sensors, with custom smart textile vibe motor actuators and a custom iPad interface for choreographic and audience interventions or 'live coding'. This new iteration of the collaborative project Hacking the Body 2.0, by media artist Camille Baker and media artist/choreographer Kate Sicchio, attempts to address the ethical issues around identity and data ownership when using wearable tech in performance. The project develops methods to use and hack commercial wearable devices, as well as making handmade e-textiles sensing devices for performance. As such, we encourage performers to access their own physiological data for personal use, but also to create unique and interactive performances. Excerpt of new video of these performances will shown and the costumes will be available (non-functioning mode) for questions and discussion