The Future of Wearables
With all the hype surrounding wearable technology it's hard to distinguish
fiction from fact. Companies like Charmed Technologies and Xybernaut would
have you believe the market is already cornered. Their systems, based on
work by seminal researchers like Thad Starner and Steve Mann, are fast
becoming commercial reality. Meanwhile, pioneers such as Maggie Orth of
International Fashion Machines and Philips Research's "soft electronics"
have changed how we perceive electronics on the body. But before people
start heading to the nearest CompUSA to place their orders, there are still
radical interpretations of the field's future left unexplored.
In the art world, Stelarc and Krzysztof Wodiczko have produced cautionary
images of technology's body integration by ignoring the expressive and
aesthetic potential of wearable technology. Today, within the interstices
of fashion, technology, and art, artist/designer hybrids are developing
work that challenges disciplinary boundaries, blurs the borders between
virtual and physical, and seeks to expand our communicative capabilities.
Taking a cross-disciplinary approach to wearables, Claudia Gudel, founder
of Basel Switzerland's Co-Lab, sees collaboration as the key. "I launch
workshops and events in the context of art, fashion and new technology in
order to find inspiring distinctions between these fields," explains Gudel.
Co-Lab's latest project, "Fab: Filters and Blockers" is a series of fashion
and technology workshops focusing on redefining protective clothing for
contemporary society. As an art and technology collective Co-Lab produces
installations, clothing, and wearable devices. Some examples are "Paul" a
skirt with built in display capabilities and "Magic Eye", a light object
that reacts to movement and sounds in space. Here, fashion and technology
contribute to a constellation of artistic activity and output.
Working with fashion as a system for interaction, Elise Co investigates the
conceptual and aesthetic potential of computational clothing. "I am
interested in multiple-body garments or networks of garments behaving in
some related way even though they are worn by different people in different
places," explains Co, Professor of New Media at Basel School of Art and
Design in Switzerland. Focusing on the exertion of data across corporeal
mass, Co's thesis from the MIT Media Lab was titled, "Computation and
Technology as Expressive Elements in Fashion." Her projects include
"Perforation", which uses fiber optics to challenge the materiality of the
body, and "Halo", a system for reconfigurable and programmable garments.
"They are designed to provoke thinking," she explains. With a background in
architecture, Elise's work treats the body and computational data as actors
within relational structures. The results are hauntingly beautiful mergers
between physical and ethereal selves.
While Co prompts critical thinking, Despina Papadopolous, founder of 5050
limited, encourages action. A philosopher and technologist, Papadopolous
collaborates with fashion designers and researchers to explore the "maximum
radius possibilities" of fashion and technology. Her projects include
"Courtly Bags", in collaboration with NYC designers As Four, and
"M-Bracelet", funded by NCR Knowledge Lab. 5050's latest project, "Moi" is
based on the idea of "staple technology" that starts with a simple bright
light. Through it's simplicity, "Moi" encourages individuals to "imagine
and transform an experience on their own terms". "[Moi is] the most basic
element turned into the most complex device once it is worn," explains
Papadopolous. Human, not technological interaction is the focus.
So far wearable computers have failed to gain public acceptance. Nobody
wants to walk around looking like a character from Star Trek. Institutions
like Interaction Design Institute IVREA, Italy and Parsons School of
Design, in New York City are taking note. They now offer courses which
investigate the expressive potential of wearables. In the artist's case,
the best approach would be greater cross-disciplinary communication through
the hybridization between art, fashion, technology, and design. With the
upcoming launch of "Moi", Papadopoulus bucks the current trends by trading
technological hype for common sense design. "The idea of a jacket with
email projected on its sleeve, or a t-shirt that reads all your vital signs
is so radically foreign to our perception of what it is to be a person, "
she laments. "It is also quite divorced from the aesthetics, social and
political nuances of clothing. If we get our way it will be about
imagination, self-expression, and most importantly, inspiration."
-Katherine Moriwaki (kaki@kakirine.com)
Related Links:
Claudia Gudel http://www.co-lab.ch
http://www.co-lab.ch/fab
Elise Co http://acg.media.mit.edu/people/elise
http://www.unibas.ch/sfg/vis_com0102/beyond
Despina Papadopoulos http://www.moinewyork.com/
http://www.5050ltd.com/
Interaction Design Institute IVREA http://www.interaction-ivrea.it
http://www.interaction-ivrea.it/en/learningresearch/events/featuredevent/20020508.asp
Parsons School of Design http://www.parsons.edu
http://a.parsons.edu/~fashiontech
