Unpatentable Multitouch Aerobics, 2015-16

Unpatentable Multitouch Aerobics

Participatory Performance and Video, 2015-16.
In collaboration with Phoebe Osborne, with costume design by Tiare Ribeaux.

Description

Unpatentable Multitouch Aerobics is a 40-minute aerobics workout routine derived from the now ubiquitous multi-touch gestures we use on our technological devices, such as two-finger scrolling, pinching and spreading to zoom, and two-finger rotating -- all of which are gestures patented by Apple, Inc. As technology and its devices teach our bodies new gestural lexicons, we are zooming, swiping, and flicking our way into a new era. But Apple is “indisputably striving to corner the market on how we move our fingers across screens,” noted Alexander Provan, citing the company’s most recent win of a patent-infringement lawsuit against Samsung for its multi-touch gestures. These gestures have an owner: every time you slide two fingers up and down a trackpad, you’re leasing your movements from Apple; and they, in turn, are owning a little part of you. Unpatentable Multitouch Aerobics asks, how are we to react in the face of the commodification and privatization of our own bodily gestures?

Unpatentable Multitouch Aerobics debuted as a participatory performance piece. Since its debut, it has been performed as a live online workshop, re-performed by other dancers, “sonified” (meaning its movements translated into a sound score) for a music festival, and its video documentation has been screened in galleries and festivals.

Performances, Exhibitions, and Screenings

“Digital Overload,” Digital Art Festival Die Digitale Dusseldorf, NRW Forum Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf, Germany. Re-performed by dancer Ale Bachlechner. Jan 11, 2019.
“HANDS ON: A Collective Haptic Perspective,” Pancake House, Minneapolis, MN. March 22 - 24, 2019.
“Sonification—Audible Data Streams Festival,” Berlin Society of New Music, Berlin, Germany. Oct 27 - 29, 2017.
“Formative and Persisting,” Sol Koffler Gallery, Providence, RI. Sep 7 - 25 2016.
“FILTER V | From Cloud to Fog: A Sonification of Digital Traces,” Zona Dynamic, SPEKTRUM art_technology_community, Berlin Germany. June 16 2016.
“Unpatentable Multitouch Aerobics,” Flee Immediately! (online). May 24 2016.
“Unpatentable Multitouch Aerobics,” transmediale, HKW, Berlin, Germany. Feb 4 2016.
“Public Interrogation: Outside the White Cube,” The Multiple Exposure Project, Public Spaces, Metro Manila, Philippines. Dec 1 - 31 2015.
“CRANK,” Southern Exposure Gallery, San Francisco, CA. Nov 20 - Dec 19 2015.
“Talking to Strangers,” SIMULTAN Festival #11, CERC, Timișoara, Romania. Oct 7 - 10 2015.
“Unpatentable Multitouch Aerobics,” World Wide West, Point Arena, CA. July 18 2015.