Explorations in Perception

I started reading See Yourself Sensing: Redefining Human Perception by Madeline Schwartzman, and boy, is it a trip. The book is a survey of projects and works that explore human perception, senses, and the body. The projects are visceral, often disturbing, provoking, and thoughtfully curated.

Hyungkoo Lee, The Objectuals

Erik Hobijn and self-immolation

Lawrence Malstaf, Shrink

One theme that drew me to this collection is best illustrated through a quote from the introduction. Schwartzman writes that "most environments are inescapably sensorial by nature. They modulate the amount of light and views we receive, the surfaces that we touch, the path of air and flow of scents and odors, the way we move our body and the way we right ourselves against gravity." And museums? Are taking advantage of all the sensory inputs or are they doing their best to minimize and mute them?

Last week I made and wore a tool to minimize my sight and give me tunnel vision. I wore the cone below around my house and wore it for a bit walking around outside and downtown.

Following the experience, I made a few sense altering tools in response. The first is a pair of goggles with mirrors attached to the lenses. The mirrored goggles increase the angles and views the wearer can access.

The second response is a full hood made with paper mache. While the hood takes away the wearer's vision, the two large ear cones going into the hood magnify the wearer's hearing.

These explorations are not made to be feasible tools for people with vision impairments. They are, rather, rapid experiments testing a few ways in which perception can be twisted or modified.