Interactive art and new media

You can rotate the circles, putting together a combination that suits specifically you. It is important to note that we have created two extra options for each circle: black and white. Black stands for opting out of a category altogether, while white is an opportunity to fill in your own choice. So if you did not find the term you would prefer, you can always add your own. Or you can completely ignore a certain category.

On some circles, you may notice apparently synonymous concepts. We chose to use them because specific words and phrases are often key to the process of constructing and representing our identities. For example, a homosexual woman may not want to refer to herself as a lesbian, but prefer the word “gay.”

We intentionally used concepts that come from different theories and approaches, some binary and others non-binary. This is not an attempt to create an objective and all-encompassing model, but rather the author’s perspective on the question of identity. Our goal is to showcase diversity, interconnectedness, and the non-linear nature of identity. We would like to inspire a discussion. You are free to decide for yourself, which of the suggested categories and options are personally relevant to you, to explore the diversity of possible combinations, and to create a reflection of your identity.

The interface is based on the principle of work of the logical machine “Ars Magna”, created by Ramon Llull. He was one of the pioneers of combinatorial science and believed that by various combinations of existing concepts one can derive new truths (similar to combining letters to form words, including new words). Ars magna was made of paper circles, and by rotating these circles the readers could make new combinations of concepts and categories, thus perceiving the world. Later this method was used in TRIZ, as well as special cards for calculating, converting values, learning irregular verbs in English, etc. 

The installation was created with support from the International Festival of Queer Culture Queer Fest 2015.

During the creative process, we analyzed various approaches, which exist in the field of sexology, gender and queer theories. We added a special dictionary to the interface, so that every viewer could check the meaning of the unfamiliar concepts he or she might come across in the circles.

At the Queer Fest, we presented the alpha-version of our installation, which we intend to improve. More specifically, to update the dictionary, to translate the interface into several languages, to make an online version, to add the option of printing out the combinations, as well as to create an interactive infographics for analyzing data from around the world.

If you are interested in our project and would like to help us with the implementation or to display our project in a museum space, we will be happy to cooperate!