digitally preserving spiritual & cultural heritage with traditional artists in second life
TRANSCRIPT
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 1
DIGITALLY PRESERVING
SPIRITUAL & CULTURAL HERITAGE
WITH TRADITIONAL ARTISTS IN
SECOND LIFE
Tonietta A. Walters1,2 and Jennifer Saxton2
¹The Arts Office Net Inc., [email protected], 2Miami Dade College,
twalters, [email protected]
ABSTRACT:
The deeply experiential nature of nondual or ethno-indigenous
cultural and spiritual traditions may not easily convert to digital
form, constraining epistemic goals of preservation. Virtual world
technology, as a participatory tool that engages users, allows
for an immersive experience and the virtual world of Second
Life has emerged as a preferred tool for providing hands-on
experiential learning. Moreover, the nature of preserving
conceivably marginalized cultural information is predicated by
attention to various aesthetic underpinnings of these milieus
when designing associated virtual environments and the objects
within them. The projects adopt a straightforward participatory
model where traditional artists or object-makers within these
cultures provide artistic material and collaboratively inform the
design process and thus augment epistemic aims of digitization.
This paper reports on the integrated praxis and theory across
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 2
topics in the digital humanities; underpinning interdisciplinary
projects that aim to digitally preserve nondual spiritual and
ethno-indigenous culture in Second Life.
1. INTRODUCTION
In an era of trans-humanism and the impending singularity, it may
be overlooked that the deeply experiential nature of nondual or
ethno-indigenous spiritual traditions might not easily convert to
digital form, constraining practical and epistemic goals of
preservation. It becomes important to devise methods for the
appropriate assimilation of technology to accommodate this
potentially marginalized aesthetic milieu.
This paper outlines the theoretical and practical aspects of various
projects undertaken to either directly convey spiritual experience
through the work of traditional artists or attempt to catalog and
preserve spiritual and cultural heritage in the virtual world of
Second Life. (Table 1)
SECTION PROJECT TITLE
2. 1. 1. FLOW IN THE ZONE: A GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE ON THE INNER
EXPERIENCE OF THE TRADITIONAL ARTIST
2. 3. 1. FLINDERS UNIVERSITY SOCIAL SCIENCES: PATHWAYS TO WELLBEING PARTICIPATORY SOFTWARE DEMO
3. 1. CITY OF SUZANO EXHIBITION AT MIAMI DADE COLLEGE VIRTUAL MUSEUM IN SECOND LIFE
Table 1: Project List.
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 3
2. BACKGROUND
Artists, in general, have the capability of tapping into a form of
nondual experience during some portions of the creative process
and are intrinsically motivated to:
1. express emotions and sensations that are akin to this type
of spiritual experience
2. use the creative process is a self-directed ritualistic avenue
that repeatedly evokes this type of experience
3. more clearly understand and express its aspects.
Surely, there will be many people (artists included) who will have
large issue with these statements. However, there it is. Intrinsic
motivation does not necessarily coincide with conscious motivation
nor preclude that those conscious motivations may have been
confabulated in order to make the drive to create consistent with
the secular world.
2. 1. PRAXIS: THE SEER MODEL OF CREATIVITY
The experience of the artist within portions of the creative
process is closely related to mystical or nondual experience.
When making an art object the most productive and successful
moments are usually when the artist has been able to reach a
certain point of efficiency – The Zone or an experience of super-
conscious flow. "The Zone" should be thought of as a place
rather than a state. It encompasses more than an emotional or
psychological state and has a palpable presence. For example,
there is a distinct feeling that happens upon returning home
from a trip. Recognition of The Zone is the same as the fleeting
thought when you finally sit in the car for the drive home from
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 4
the airport or turn the key in your front door. You have been
home since the plane landed, but it doesn't register in this
certain way until one of these moments. Home, or The Zone, is
a place where a person functions optimally, because of
familiarity or the sense of freedom within recognizable
constraints. In other words, certain things are allowed to drop
from conscious awareness, because an established pattern has
been set. The feeling of being in The Zone can only seem to be
described in opposites and in descriptions is analogous to a
mystical, nondual experience. A true description of this type of
awareness has eluded many – this feeling of being at one with
something larger.
An art object is not only an expression of the individual artist‟s
experience; it becomes a psychological "capture" of the moment
of expression – including such glimpses of nonduality. By
analyzing artwork both during the process and upon completion
to learn about the underlying structure of the creative process,
the artwork becomes an extended memory aid that is relied on
to draw conclusions about the meaning of the experience of
expression itself. It is important that this "memory" remain as
accurate as possible and that chosen materials captured the
experience and maintained the integrity of the moment while
still conveying both the ephemeral and ethereal nature of a
moment of experience or being.
The SEER [Self Extension and Experience Realization] Model of
Creativity is based on extensive creativity meta-research by
Richard Tabor Greene, Professor of Knowledge and Creativity at
Kwansei University in Japan. It is a synthesis of Self-Type 33:
Extended Self-Development and Mind Type 41: Experience
Realization Forms (Greene 2001). The SEER Model both
identifies a personal methodology in the phenomenological
investigation of inner experience and brackets highly subjective
portions within the creative process and aesthetic experience of
an artist – such as The Zone‟s super-conscious flow. A
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 5
description of the SEER Model of Creativity is outlined as
follows:
1. The practicing artist should be at a level of practice
that:
a. is both self-initiated and goal directed,
b. includes set ideas or concepts to focus on for the
making of art.
2. The artwork is approached:
a. in a questioning manner that is of a personal
nature
b. with an awareness of attempting to answer
internal questions caused by an encounter with
some aspect of Nondual experience.
3. The artist is engaged in a continuing process of
investigating the source and meaning of the tangible
objects produced including using them to objectively
analyze moments of the creative process that are deeply
subjective.
Developing an „expertise‟ or facility with metacognition, as is
needed for the SEER Model, is predetermined within the art
making process itself.
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 6
2. 1. 1. FLOW IN THE ZONE: A GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE
ON THE INNER EXPERIENCE OF THE TRADITIONAL
ARTIST
Figure 1: Flow Exhibition.
Flow – a smooth uninterrupted movement or progress
Zone – a temporary state of heightened concentration that
enables peak performance
„Flow‟ in addition to the Merriam-Webster definition above is
widely referenced as a concept characterized as “a mental state
of operation in which the person is fully immersed in what he or
she is doing, characterized by a feeling of energized focus, full
involvement, and success in the process of the activity.”
(Csikszentmihalyi 1996)
Art+Science France is a non-for-profit organization that aims to
facilitate dialogue between artists, scientists and educators who
are interested in the connections between art and cognitive
science. The Flow exhibition series is a program of Art+Science
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 7
France that gives platform to art and artists using traditional
media in the investigation or simple expression of inner
experience within the creative process.
This exhibition in the series was realized at the Miami Dade
Virtual College Second Life Island, Display Room One. Nine
international contemporary fine artists contributed paintings,
drawings and sculpture to the virtual exhibition:
• Pip Brant-USA
• Alete Burgé-USA
• Alicia Falcone-Argentina
• Luisa Mesa-Cuba
• Jose Polet-Belgium
• Policarpo Ribeiro-Brazil
• Nathalie Sebregts-Netherlands
• Ricardo Triana-Colombia
• Tonietta Walters-Jamaica
2. 2. THEORY: KANTIAN AESTHETICS
An aspect of art as the medium for aesthetic experience is the
encounter with an underlying essential truth. Within the artist‟s
aesthetic experience as part of the creative process there is
more often than not the experience of super-conscious flow
[See Section 2.1. for a description of The Zone].
The common usage of the term aesthetic experience is
generated from the activity of appreciation of an object. The
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 8
aesthetic experience of the viewer is extrinsic to the object
itself; therefore it is necessary to make a distinction between
the viewer‟s aesthetic experience and the artist‟s experience.
To come to an understanding of the intrinsic purpose of an art
object one inevitably has to direct some questioning to the
object-maker. In Kantian Aesthetics “the problem … is not how
[art] is judged by a viewer, but how it is created. The solution
revolves around two new concepts: the „genius‟ and „aesthetic
ideas‟.” (Burnham 2005)
Figure 2: Kantian Free Harmony as a Nondual State.
Kant includes as a part of aesthetic experience “a mental state
similar to cognition called the „free harmony of the imagination
and the understanding.‟ And, an object that is able to occasion
such a state of free harmony is said to exhibit „purposiveness
without purpose.‟” (Rogerson 2008) The question becomes “how
this natural purposiveness is to be explained. The only possible
account is that the appearance of purposiveness in nature is
conditioned by the supersensible realm underlying nature. But
this means that beauty is a kind of revelation of the hidden
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 9
substrate of the world.” (Burnham 2005) This translates to an
encounter with the noumenal „world‟ through the aesthetic
experience which is a quasi-cognitive „free harmony‟ state of
perceptual ambiguity – a glimpse of nonduality.
“What genius does, Kant says, is to provide „soul‟ or „spirit‟ … to
what would otherwise be uninspired. … Genius inspires art
works – gives them spirit – and does so by linking the work of
art to what Kant will call aesthetic ideas ... which [are] a
presentation of the imagination to which no thought is
adequate.” (Burnham 2005) These nondual experiences are
indescribable using common language or, more accurately,
understanding cannot be reached through language alone. A
similar or familiar experience has to be evoked in the viewer.
Art objects themselves, by bringing into being an overwhelming
experience in the viewer, inherently contribute to the idea of
the artist as divine messenger or divinely inspired. This basic
process of appreciation of the object, leading to a type of
overwhelming experience is in keeping with the idea of the
ineffable nature of both religious and aesthetic experience. In
other words, the object created to express an experience
beyond words leads to an experience or psychological state that
is in itself indescribable.
“In the judgment of the beautiful, we had a [free]
harmony between the imagination and the
understanding, such that each furthered the extension
of the other. … a harmony which happens on the
experiencing of a beautiful form that itself is the
expression of something yet higher but that cannot in
any other way be expressed. (The notion of „expression‟
is important: what Kant is describing is an aesthetic
process, rather than a process of understanding
something with concepts, and then communicating that
understanding.) Inspired fine art is … an expression of
the state of mind which is generated by an aesthetic
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 10
idea.” (Burnham 2005)
Fine artists express this aesthetic idea and make it extensible
through:
1. repeatedly [and ritualistically] revisiting the experience
within the creative process in order to
2. refine and develop a form of „expertise‟ in the
expression of the aesthetic idea, therefore
3. eliciting [extending] this kind of experience to the art
viewer.
Adopting this nondual interpretation within Kantian aesthetics
affords a definitive conceptual grounding for the SEER Model of
Creative Practice [Section 2. 1.] as a process that aids in
investigating and creatively expressing altered states of
consciousness, specifically nondual experience.
2. 3. SYNTHESIS: PARTICIPATORY MODEL
The nature of preserving conceivably marginalized cultural
information is predicated by attention to the artistic
underpinnings when designing associated virtual environments
and the objects within them. However, creativity seems to be
an innate ability outside of description or effective analysis.
Moreover, the creative process is a troubling enigma,
notoriously difficult to pin down and understand, even for those
who are recognized as creative individuals. In order to be
mindful of the intricacies of the creative process and creative
personality, these projects adopt a straightforward participatory
model where traditional artists or object-makers work
collaboratively with the virtual world designer.
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 11
The participating artist gives an oral or written presentation of
his intentions and the artwork, including the
ideas/processes/chosen imagery found in the work, a self-
report of success or failure at correlating his intentions to his
representations and possible changes or intended future
directions. This collaborative process is an inter-subjective
mirror of the steps that are involved in internal cognitive
monitoring of the designer during the creative process and
engenders a deeper understanding of the traditional artist‟s
intentions; to subsequently inform the digital reinterpretation of
the artwork, the related environment and exhibition design.
2. 3. 1. FLINDERS UNIVERSITY SOCIAL SCIENCES:
PATHWAYS TO WELLBEING PARTICIPATORY SOFTWARE
DEMO
The Flinders University project is funded by an Australian Research
Council Linkage Grant. It is a social inclusion project targeted to
Aboriginal users of social service agencies.
Figure 3: Pathways to Wellbeing Work Station.
Project Team
Co-researchers at Neporendi,
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 12
Jon Deakin - PhD Student, Governance & Public
Management
Dr Denise DeVries – Researcher, informatics and
engineering.
Assoc Prof Janet McIntyre - Chief investigator, policy &
management, critical systemic approach.
Assoc Prof Doug Morgan - Chief investigator, cultural studies
and Aboriginality
Kim O‟Donnell, mentor at CRCAH, Flinders University
Prof Anne Roche - Chief investigator, public health
Prof John Roddick - Chief investigator. Informatics and
engineering
Prof Tonietta Walters, Graphics and Second Life designer
Bevin Wilson – Mentor at Yunggorendi
Project Description
Demonstration of the Pathways to Wellbeing software involves
two people sitting alongside each other while using the software
on a computer screen in an art gallery setting located on the
Flinders Island. The demonstration Second Life must be
recorded and linked to the Pathways to Wellbeing website as
per the slides.
Each registrant must have an avatar in order to book a time to
watch a real time demonstration. Registrants need to nominate
if they wish to try out the software. Time will be allocated for
people to try out the software after the demonstration.
Registrants have the option of providing some artwork to post
in the gallery of what wellbeing means to them.
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 13
3. SECOND LIFE AS DIGITAL HUMANITIES
The choice of an installation or assemblage of objects is meant to
emphasize a feeling of place. In creating a "space", the viewer is
given an area to "approach". This will mirror the experience of
creating; where the mental gaze is fixed on a goal and this goal
space is something to work toward. This way, the viewer processes
information from the reference point of their own experience -
translating from a visceral or aesthetic response to intellectual
understanding. In Second Life, where both 2-dimensonal and 3-
dimensional artworks can be displayed as reinterpretations of real
life creations, the concept of „installation‟ is exponentially extended
by the possibility of informational augmentation. Substantiating
speculative theory in aesthetics and philosophy of mind
necessitates ensuring both reliability and efficiency in
information processing, documentation and preservation
including broadening the network of information from individual
subjective experience to a global sampling of artists and
cultures.
Digital Humanities according to the National Endowment for the
Humanities is “an umbrella term for a number of different
activities that surround technology and humanities scholarship”
where “most of these digital humanities activities involve
collections of cultural heritage materials, which are one of the
primary objects of study for researchers across all humanities
disciplines.” (Bobley 2008) Current virtual world technology is
an essential component for solving the problem of appropriate
levels of interaction. While there is the issue that “3D worlds
are clearly not appropriate architectures for disseminating large
amount of information, as neither lectures nor expansive
documents work well with new means of communication. These
limitations ironically encouraged creative cooperation and
interaction” (Di Blas, Paolini and Hazan 2003)
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 14
Because of international availability, Second Life allows for a
more diverse participation of artists using „low-tech‟ traditional
media to contribute and collaborate as in the Flow Exhibition
[Section 2. 1. 1.]. The „viewer‟ experiences an immersive
environment and a sense of spatial interactivity with the
artworks as in a virtual reality game. Gaming as social
undertaking also informs the usability of Second Life for more
„serious‟ pursuits. “The social nature of Second Life is a critical
component of understanding what it is and how it can, and
should, be used.” (Urban et al 2007)
The participatory model [Section 2.3] combines aspects of both
gallery (the presenting of artists) and museum (the presenting
of objects) processes for a more comprehensive gathering of
information and cultural knowledge. “The development of
synchronous and social activities, such as lectures, collaborative
builds, and accepting feedback from visitors, is a hallmark of SL
museums.” (Urban et al 2007) The layering of methods in
creating a virtual environment for preservation enables the
possibility of dialogue combining the methodology of library
sciences and artistic expertise in experiences involving a deep
subjectivity. This opens up additional possibilities for fruitful
inter-subjective and/or experimental approaches.
3. 1. CITY OF SUZANO EXHIBITION AT MIAMI DADE
COLLEGE VIRTUAL MUSEUM IN SECOND LIFE
The Office of Cultural and Architectural Heritage for the City of
Suzano in the Alto Tiête Region of Sao Paolo, Brazil wants to
preserve the cultural heritage of their diverse peoples - including
large Japanese and Afro-Brazilian populations. They envision a
project of digital preservation that includes a virtual reality
component. The Arts Office Net, Inc. in the US and the artists of
The Arts Office Brazil in Suzano will work with Miami Dade College
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 15
(MDC) to create a virtual world exhibition at the MDC Virtual
Museum in Second Life.
Figure 4: Miami Dade College Virtual Museum.
The MDC Virtual Museum will be housed in a “building” that
combines aspects of real world brick and mortar spaces with
physically unrealizable design elements, thereby creating an
environment that is at once familiar and fantastic. As a familiar
space, the museum will allow visitors to engage in “ritual” (Duncan
1995) not in the religious sense, but in terms of behaviors
traditionally associated with cultural institutions, i.e. quiet
contemplation and academic inquiry. As an imaginative space, the
museum will provide an environment uniquely conducive to creative
pursuits, and in which direct interaction between visitor and object
is encouraged and facilitated. This type of engagement is one of
three visit-rituals that define museum ecology (Bell 2002), the other
two being liminality and sociality. The ability to socialize is a
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 16
fundamental component of virtual worlds. Second Life is very much
a social network, in which “residents” have the freedom to
represent themselves exactly as they wish in terms of physical
appearance, and where interaction with strangers is not only
common and acceptable, but is often the expected behavior.
3. 1. 1. EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITIES
The MDC Virtual Museum will provide unique educational
opportunities for students and researchers. Faculty from a variety
of disciplines may be inspired to design exhibition-based curriculum
that incorporates one or more of the College‟s General Education
Learning Outcomes, a set of ten learning goals “that emphasize the
lifelong skills needed to be successful in work and life and to
participate in our society as a global citizen.” The museum will
serve as an additional course writing assignment for the Philosophy
of Religion and Philosophy of Art sections of an Introduction to
Philosophy course. A portion of the museum project also includes a
student gallery to offer the students from the MDC Computer Arts &
Animation program the opportunity for hands-on extra-credit
assignments of creating additional art objects and spiritual rituals
within the virtual museum setting including interactive reference
material. Specific learning outcomes that apply to the City of
Suzano exhibition include:
1. Exhibition Design
a. Within the 3D virtual environment, design students
learn to visually & spatially organizing objects for
maximum interactivity.
b. The humanities course will be enriched by the
optimal visually and spatially designed immersive
environment.
2. Digital Cataloguing
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 17
a. Design students learn the process of embedding
reference material within the virtual objects and to
create graphic interactive displays.
b. Humanities students will benefit from having the
combination of visual and textual reference.
3. Cross Cultural Sensitivity
a. Design students create objects and environments to
represent a specific culture.
b. Humanities students will be exposed to immersive
representations of other cultures.
3. 1. 2. INTERPRETIVE/REFERENCE MATERIALS
Interpretive materials that typically accompany museum objects can
be delivered to the virtual visitor in a variety of ways, incorporating
interactive access to a variety of information resources.
Figure 5: Artist Information Board.
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 18
These materials, embedded in or near the images and objects, may
include:
1. Documentary and multimedia artistic video of specific
cultural and/or spiritual rituals.
2. Commentary/analysis of the artwork by course instructors
or other authoritative voices.
3. Documentary video of the artist at work.
4. Primary source material, such as artist narratives or
interviews from the participatory collaboration process.
5. An image gallery of additional real world works by the artist,
and/or similar works by other artists, possibly representing
other cultures, time periods, etc.
6. Questions for visitors to consider when viewing individual
works or the exhibition as a whole.
7. Hyperlinks to related locations within Second Life to which
visitors may teleport.
8. Hyperlinked bibliography or virtual reference shelf providing
point-of-need access to relevant library holdings available in
electronic format.
9. Point-of-need access (via embedded widget) to “Ask-a-
Librarian,” a joint project of the Tampa Bay Library
Consortium and Florida‟s College Center for Library
Automation, which provides virtual reference assistance via
live chat or email.
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 19
Figure 6: Notecard giver.
The listed interpretative and reference materials, including topical
menus with pre-recorded responses from which the visitor may
interactively select, would be delivered through various applications
and options:
1. Text-based note-card
2. HUD (Heads-up Display) attachments
3. Greeting Bot (human like automated information kiosks)
4. Looping slideshow display, or other multi-media
5. Future possibilities include the incorporation of augmented
reality mobile technologies such as QR codes, which are
barcodes that can be scanned by camera phones and
smartphones, allowing a visitor to collect information about
the object with a hand-held device.
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 20
The virtual visitor is afforded the opportunity to interact with objects
in a manner only possible within a virtual environment including the
ability to rotate a three-dimensional work, to immerse oneself in a
work with Second Life‟s “mouseview” feature, or to participate in a
spontaneous or scheduled real-time discussion with other museum
visitors in different parts of the world.
The attention to theoretical and practical groundwork of preserving
spiritual and cultural heritage as outlined throughout provides an
integrated methodology for virtual world assimilations of real world
concepts; therefore the virtual visitor has the ability to manipulate
these resources to meet personal preferences to information
processing, thus bolstering comprehensive epistemic objectives.
Preserving Spiritual & Cultural Heritage with Traditional Artists In Second Life 21
REFERENCES:
Bell (2002) Making sense of museums: The museum as “cultural ecology.”
Intel Corporation © 1999-2002.
Bobley (2008) Why the Digital Humanities? Presentation to the National
Council on Humanities, National Endowment for the Humanities, July 24.
Burnham (2005) Kant‟s Aesthetics, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy,
June 30.
Csikszentmihalyi (1996) Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery
and Invention, HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. New York, NY, USA.
Duncan (1995) Civilizing rituals: inside public art museums, Routledge, New
York, NY, USA.
Di Blas, Paolini and Hazan (2003) The SEE Experience: Edutainment in 3D
Virtual Worlds, Museums and the Web 2003, Charlotte, NC, USA, March 19-
22.
Greene (2001) A Model of 42 Models of Creativity, School of Policy Studies,
Kwansei Gakuin University, Sanda, Japan.
Rogerson (2008) The Problem of Free Harmony in Kant's Aesthetics, State
University of New York Press, Albany, NY USA
Urban et al. (2007) A Second Life for Your Museum: 3D Multi-User Virtual
Environments and Museums, in J. Trant and D. Bearman (eds.). Museums
and the Web 2007, San Francisco, CA, USA, April 11-14.