Thoughts on Interactivity and the Importance of the Medium

INTERACTIVITY

Interactivity comes in many forms:

– between creator and consumer

– between human and medium

– between real and fictional – between me and the cosmic consumer (see “The Conversation”) – between different versions of oneself Usually, an interaction (of any kind) is supposed to have an impact on at least one of the parties involved. Art becomes interactive when the audience's involvement and direct action changes the work in a way that does not “destroy” it – interactive art is therefore only possible with the original artist's intention. Sometimes interacting with a person, idea, object or concept can provide the entire essence of an artwork – be it as part of research or in the creational process. That is when I speak of artistic interactivity.

How mediums add dimension

Comics add the visuals to a prosaic text, while audio books paint a picture with sound. Combine the two and supplement movement, and we have film: a layer of medium that contains timing independent from its consumer – novel in the sense that it is supposed to be viewed in one sitting.

To further expand the user's experience, reaching the (current) last layer of artistic variety, just add interactivity. The game is born, the ultimate medium transmitting information on all levels, in both directions, and thereby completing the circle of input and output, by enabling the consumer to grow beyond his role and actively take part in the story himself.

With every artistic dimension added by the work's creator, however, the counterpart formerly existing only in the consumer's imagination is lost.

The game regains that design freedom, structural strength and almost magical momentum of letting the consumer make choices within their experience. The most important difference now is that these choices are not personal any more: individual decisions become universal ones, and that is precisely where the medium makes thetranscend outside of the realm of a closed imagination into the realm of hive minds, collective experience and a potential universal truth.

VOM INDIVIDUUM ZUM UNIVERSUM

Why game?

So I have learned that game is situated in the highest layer a medium can be in. It consists of the most dimensions, combining visuals, sound, movement and timing with interactivity – creating an uniquely immersive all-round experience for the user.

I believe that the desire to have an impact, to co-create your own story within the given world of the medium, is met best in games of all kinds.

Not only the user's experience is altered by this freedom, however, but also the game itself: Suddenly the story is entirely dependent on its consumer, blurring the lines between audience and creator. In some cases, there are so many choices to be made along the way, that in the end, no two people have played the same game.

This uniqueness, combined with the user's personal experience, is what lets them melt with the story to some degree – that is why in many games you play a modifiable character, to achieve this stage effortlessly – turning their individual experience into an endeavour shaping not only knowledge and understanding, but also identity.

In role-playing games specifically, though, the players do not only interact with the game itself, but also with others.

This way, they are able to share their formerly only individual, unrecreatable experiences. What was unique to one player before, is now unique to a group – something that cannot be found in any other type of medium.

Artist

Game Player

Credit to the medium

Artistic work that uses parts generated not by the human “artist”, but by a system out of nature, a computer or other types of chance-produced creation, is usually regarded as generative art. While some of my experiments border this area very closely, I do want to distance my project from this art form.

The important distinction to make is that in my works, the creator either remains human (albeit often springing from the depths of subconsciousness) or lies in the medium itself – which still only reinstates the artist by giving form and dictating involuntary choices.

When explaining the experiment called “The Hermann Story”, I explain this difference between a “human computer” and an actual non-human algorithm at the example of the game.

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Growing up, books and stories were very important to me. I used to play out different situations; our house and garden were my laboratory, doctor's office, farm, shopping centre, school, church, concert hall and outer space. These fictitious worlds were just as real to me as anything else, just on another level.

When I got older, I began focusing more and more on the creators of my beloved stories: my interest expanded from the artwork to the artists and their process. I found the technicalities of world building, character design and plotting to be just as fascinating as the atmosphere they produce.

Now I know that what my younger self felt, but did not understand, was the simple urge to create experiences for myself – to live with my mind through what was not possible to do with my body.

But not only the characters and their creators earned a special place in my heart: in many cases the medium bringing the stories to me came just as close, transmitter and recipient bonding in the experience they shared, shaping each other along the way. An object like a book can hold more associations than the name of the author or even the book title – after all those hours spent together, the medium becomes an artefact not only of the artist's intention, but also of my affection towards it as the reader. It combines the input coming from both ends and thereby emerges unique, evolved separately from others of its kind that have yet to be filled with a reader's compassion.

This manifestation of the consumer's bond to the medium becomes tangible to the sensitive mind: try visiting a library and comparing it to a shop selling brand-new books. The used ones will have a flood of emotions streaming out of them, telling now not only the story of the author, but also of its former reader's experience. Every tear shed over a character's death, even if dried out, adds to the charm and importance of the gem. Suspense shows in every crease, worn-out covers more often meaning great affection and connection than neglect.

(You might not be too surprised to learn that after iArts, I will be working as a bookbinder and restorer.)

There is a great difference between the inventor of a story and its teller. Nowadays we don't tend to separate these two any more as much as we should, creators often taking over both roles at once. But the role of the middleman can also be filled by who is generally regarded as the consumer.

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