The Cambridge dictionary defines a lifeform as any living thing. The concept of ‘living’ becomes complex when taking into account the advanced digital age we live in today.
The exploration of digital life at the Universal Everything – Lifeforms exhibition subverts the simplicity in the living, experimenting with the personification of everyday items inside the digital world. Through the artwork, we are encouraged to consider the possibility of constructing living beings such as microorganisms or plants through projection, generative video, sound, and interaction.
Despite this being the fourth immersive audio/visual show at 180 The Strand in the last eighteen months, this was my first time engaging with their ideas and concepts. The galleries and exhibitions I had previously visited worked alongside the conventions of classic art, showcasing the colourful explosions of paint on paper, or the result of long, hard hours manipulating clay. My perception of art as a whole was transformed during this exhibition and consequently, I thoroughly enjoyed my experience there.
The opening room of the exhibition is essentially a blank canvas with a sloping walkway. Named Primordial, the piece inhabiting this space depicts a stylized, coloured take on cellular microscopic life. Projection of these organism’s flow down the slope of the room with audio responsive qualities, moving and growing to the pulse of sound and allowing them to move with their own impetus. The piece addresses the point at which life emerges, as a hint of life has become a soulful organism through technology.
Infinity was my favourite in the exhibition as during my time in London, I could recognize the artworks distinct inspiration. The piece was originally on show at a subway station in South Korea since early 2022 – a fitting home due to the similarities between these creatures and commuters. The electronic screen that followed round most of the exhibition focused on human qualities of commuters, such as the movement of hair as it flops, spikes and frizzes. The collection of characters, walk, stumble, limp and even run to take over the annoying slow walker in front of them. They echo early 20th century futurist sculptures of Boccoioni which aim to capture an abstracted body in movement, but with the added factor of technology we are met with an infinitely varied stream of characters.
An interactive feature of the exhibition was Future You, commissioned by the Barbican for an exhibition about the relationship between humanity and AI in 2019. Using a digital mirror, a synthetic version of the viewer is presented which only comes to life after being activated by someone in front of it. After every movement, the creature that is reflected changes shape and form, linking the human and robotic. Every interaction is entirely unique to whoever stands before it and when each individual’s time is up, this techno mirror collapses.
Can humans teach machines to move? Machine Learning experiments with just that, using research into motion capture for collaboration with dancer and choreographer Dwayne-Antony Simms. Displayed is a duet between machine and dancer – a conversation of mimicry, balance, and challenge. Choreography expresses human emotion in a machine, showing how dance lets humanity emerge from the abstract.
Another fun generative video work, Maison Autonome pushes the limits of visual technological innovations to create a fantasy fashion show. The commitment to the fashion show aesthetic was admirable, with the chairs lined up in rows mimicking the layout of real fashion events. The endless characters strut towards the viewer in a randomized combination of form, size and material, the anthropomorphic walk and personality showcasing the unique makeup of the characters. The piece almost questions the role of the human, such as the need for designers in society as we now have the technological advances to create robotic beings that do exactly what humans can.
Despite there being so many more creative works I could mention from this exhibition, the last one I wanted to talk about was the most immersive and inclusive. Communion was designed to create the sense that you’re surrounded by life, rather than abstract digital shapes. Located in a separate room in the building, the 360-degree audio visual installation completely envelops the viewer in the middle of hundreds of unique multi- limbed organic beings which pulse to the soundtrack in synchronized rhythm. The similarity to humanity lies through dancers in a rave, lost in connected Euphoria, suggesting technology as a friend, not a foe.