Throughout both of the articles that combine exertion and interactive experiences, I kept thinking that it would be helpful if there was a way to let users have the same experiences, while making them more accessible to a larger number of people. There are certainly health benefits to having interactive games tied to physical exertion, and I really liked the idea of only being able to completely hear the poem if you’re accelerating along with the poem/hand-clapping, etc. I also liked that runners had the space to catch back up before the poem faded out.
I found the Stelarc interview to be interesting. I found his piece with the robot arm to different, and while interesting, it’s not something that I’d want to necessarily see more than once. So it was interesting to see some of the more ‘edgy’ ideas that he had. I was particularly struck by his statement that (I’m paraphrasing here) when he feels that the performances are predictable, and the tech becomes more important than the performance, he stops doing them. Because I feel like the examples of his work that I’ve seen, the tech does take over the performance.
I had a really hard time with the ‘I Like America and America Likes Me’ piece. I had a hard time following along, and had to actually take a look at the link listed under the video. After doing that, I had a clearer idea of what the piece was meant to do. Having the blog link, was helpful in helping me to get what the artist was trying to express, without making me feel frustrated that I couldn’t get it.