Neuromatic Game Art

Wider arts-based research context / theoretical framework Game Art currently undergoes a rush of presence and importance in the context of artistic research, as it informs methods of insight and experiments. This happens at the same moment as new mobile interfaces linking body, brain, and electronic networks become available in a subtly gamified world. Ludic Theory, the concept of Flow, and the transformative potential of play will serve as theoretical frameworks for a series of publicly performed artistic experiments evolving around neurointerfaces. Hypotheses / research questions / objectives According to our hypothesis the everyday availability of neurointerfaces will create new dimensions of social and ethical questions reaching from of privacy and surveillance to self-optimization, but will also carry the potential for new forms of creativity and interaction. As arts-based research question we take up the challenge to critically evaluate neurointerfaces as technological devices of potential everyday use. Our research objective is the creation of a new form of experimental game art the neuromatic one to contribute new knowledge, awareness, and resilience, and to elucidate ethical questions, possibilities and limitations of technologies that intrude the individual brain and to ultimately change self-optimization into self-expression. Approach / methods In a series of staged and performed artworks informed by Game art, concepts of Flow and play, we will create a hybrid interplay and inquiry of questions around personal data and brain measurement informed by the neuroscientific research and techno-philosophical discourse that accompanies the project. By artistic re- engineering neurointerfaces will be transformed from intrusive measurement devices into participative and creative tools. Level of originality / innovation The present project constitutes a unique, original, and urgently needed critical but playful artistic examination of an emerging technology. The prototypes and artefacts of our research, a new innovative form of modified playful neuromatic devices, will be the seed for further artistic and philosophical use. Primary staff involved in the project The highly transdisciplinary project is carried out by five experienced researchers from complementary fields. The leading roles are held by artistic researchers. Margarete Jahrmann is an experienced artist, professor in the artistic research PhD program at Angewandte Vienna and in Game Arts at the Zurich University of the Arts. Ruth Schnell is a leading media artist and holds the chair for Digital Arts, Angewandte Vienna. The techno- philosophical research line is led by Mark Coeckelbergh (University of Vienna). Stefan Glasauer (Brandenburg University of Technology Cottbus-Senftenberg) guides the neuroscientific research. The group will be complemented by several young emerging artists and researchers.

Final project summary The artistic research project Neuromatic Game Art, a collaboration of game arts, philosophy, and neuroscience, developed experimental game systems that explored the possibilities and limits of neurointerface-technology at the intersection of brain, computer, and arts. Electroencephalography (EEG) was used to measure the electrical activity of the brain. The project developed artistic forms of representing the resulting data streams in image and sound to make flow states and brain waves accessible in public performances in a playful ludic way. This experimental "Ludic Method", a major advance in art-science using repeatable and quantifiable rule systems in an artistic context, allowed to playfully integrate brain-computer interfaces into a publicly performed discourse of ethical dimensions from self-optimization using consumer-neurointerfaces to collection of personal data for AI training and the privacy issues associated with it. However, rather than utilizing neurointerfaces only in their original purpose as measurement devices of brain activity, the project re-purposed them as artistic medium for self-expression instead of self-optimization, allowing signals such as muscle activity or electrode slippage that would have been regarded as artifacts in a scientific context to be used equally and meaningfully as data in the artistic context. Already at project start, the Ludic Method approach resulted in a novel format of publicly performed artistic research, the Neuromatic Brainwave broadcasts series on social media (YouTube) in 2020 during the Covid-19 lockdowns. Art installations, exhibitions, festivals, and performances based on the same principle of playful public experimentation followed and are documented on the project webpage https://neuromatic.uni-ak.ac.at. One of the highlights was a public performance using EEG and artificial intelligence in 2021, a neurophilosophical game chat. A large language model asked techno-philosopher Mark Coeckelbergh questions about the project while his brain activity was recorded. Another important performance was "Zero Action in the Savings Bank", which dealt with the possible synchronization of brain signals from two performers in the cashier's hall of the Otto Wagner Postsparkasse, an architectural icon in Vienna. In this metaphoric work, there was no monetary transaction in the cashier's hall, only the flow of thoughts between both performers resting on examination couches and filmed by surveillance cameras. Brain waves, measured via neuro-interfaces, appeared live on a large screen like stock market prices. The Ludic Method thus allowed to lucidly demonstrate that test subjects are also experimenters by shifting the roles and making all participants co-researchers. This enabled the research project to open new ways of dealing with novel technology, adopting and examining it in an artistic setting, transporting research out of the lab into the public in a playful way, and liberating technology in a form of self-empowerment from its potentially intimidating aura and exaggerated expectations.