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MVCR 1 (1) pp. 115127 Intellect Limited 2010

Metaverse Creativity Volume 1 Number 1

2010 Intellect Ltd Article. English language. doi: 10.1386/mvcr.1.1.115_1

KEYWORDS

puppetavatarmixed realityparadoxritualperformancemetaverse

SEMI RYUVirginia Commonwealth University

Virtual puppet, my love

impossible

ABSTRACT

This article expounds upon the convergence of two seemingly disparate psychic manifestations; namely the mode of Han, a mindset deeply embedded in traditional Korean culture and the contemporary relationship of a human handler to his or her avatar in three dimensional virtual environments. As an artist whose artistic medium is virtual puppetry performed through three dimensional media, the author has found an extreme state of paradox as a key aspect of her own Korean culture, embodied by the concept of Han as the paradoxical state of the human psyche, initi-ated from the micro-politics of body. This article investigates the potential relation between human and virtual bodies, and avatars and their users in a paradoxical manner: this is a story of the love impossible.

INTRODUCTION

There is an interesting paradox in Korean thought. One methodology in Korean Son Buddhism is called Hwadu(Why dharma went to the east?). Hwadu is a word that cuts off the paths of language and thought. It completely cuts off all conceivable exits, therefore, one cannot settle down. Hwadu activates massive doubts: in the state of being lost in complete chaos. It continuously fights against our tendency to stabilize man-made structures such as language and rational thought. It is interesting that Hwadu uses lan-guage in order to fight against language. It would be painful to stay within such a problematic structure. It is difficult to live with dilemmas but it is

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equally difficult to continuously fight for them. This is the extreme structure of paradox.

Paradoxical structures can be seen in layers of mixed reality, as continu-ous conflicts, emerging between actual/ virtual presence, and man/ machine. The author perceives a similarity between such states and the Korean clowns tightrope walking, which looks risky, unstable and unbalanced, continuously swinging left and right. The clown usually holds a fan in one hand, which seems to defy the act of balancing, but actually demonstrates a different philosophy: that of oscillating continuously between balance and unbalance, in order to find the greater moment of balancing. It is the cosmic tree, which connects between separated poles: left and right. The taller the cosmic tree the more unstable it appears, and, paradoxically, the greater its stillness also appears. It is the paradoxical process: what can be termed as ritual. The potential relationship between the user and his/ her avatar can be discussed in this paradoxical context. Its complexity goes far beyond singular expressions such as control, immersion or interaction.

Potential relationships between subject and object have been the primary issue in the authors ongoing virtual puppetry projects. What would be the potential ritual between virtual puppet/puppeteer, and user/avatar? What would be the height of the cosmic tree in between the two states? What would be distance between a virtual puppet and a puppeteer? The parameter of the distance is not only physical, but also emotional, and psychological. In the romantic sense, it would be a distance between lovers, embroiled in a continuous process of becoming and farewell. It would be the story of love impossible.

This article will explore the micro-relationship between puppets and their puppeteers within the context of love impossible. The Korean cultural psyche Han will be introduced to explain this tearful story, in an extreme state of grief but with a fearsome desire for challenging impossibility; the authors virtual puppet performance Parting on Z will also be introduced within the context of love impossible, exploring the Korean concept of Han within virtual puppetry.

THE PUPPET

It has been found that the cultural, social and philosophical meanings of words have been driven in different ways. Migrating to different language environments, the author herself has experienced miscommunications, caused by cultural differences and different modes of thinking. Language suggests a certain assumption of understanding things and experience. Fundamental ideas associated with it are an invisible system we usually take for granted. Thus many terms which frequently appear in new media such as interaction, immersion, puppet, are all open questions.

The word puppet is interesting in and of itself due to a dynamic range of different interpretations. A puppet is a simple object related to humans, easily situated within our contemporary daily lives, as well as popular play spaces including online virtual games and the metaverse. It can provide a playful and interesting platform for debates, contrasting different thoughts and perspectives.

There are a number of definitions of the puppet, deeply rooted in the hier-archical separation of subject and object, based on western cultural traditions (Shershow 1995: 1415.) The puppet has served as a metaphor for power rela-tionships an object to be controlled by man, the puppet master. This idea has been also been passed into the digital realm, from the avatar to automated


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programming languages, invisibly supporting the ontological lowness of the puppet.

Shershow points out the ontological lowness of the puppet in his book, Puppets and Popular Culture, saying that Pupa seems to manifest at once a psychosexual expectation of gender behaviour (little girls play with dolls) and a more general semantic impulse of diminution, that is the small made even smaller (Shershow 1995: 17, 69.) Furthermore, the Latin term pupa itself derives from the Indo-European root pou (little), which figures in other English words such as pupil, puppy, puberty, pauper and poverty a semantic map of social and corporeal subordination.

Puppets have been understood pretty much in the power structure of a man-made system, suggesting a certain prototype of subject/object relation-ship. In the metaverse, the avatar as a new type of puppet seems to be the newest extension of puppets within a hierarchical structure. A users strong attachment to his/her avatar has been frequently explained in terms of aspects of easier and more precise control of the digital body, thus magnifying the power relationships between the puppet and the puppeteer (Meadows 2007: 36.) Bringing the diverse perspectives of puppets to light would be a great place to start a further discussion of the user/avatar relationship.

PUPPET: THE RITUAL OBJECT PARTING ON THE Z-AXIS

Historically, there is clear evidence of how ritual objects such as masks have been transformed into puppets, showing the inherent connection between ritual and puppetry (Baird 1965: 3031.) Masks are considered the evolutionary step before the puppet. They were gradually transformed so that they could be held in front of the body, and subsequently made to move by strings. In primitive societies there has been a widespread use of the articulated mask in religious ceremonies, pointing towards clear evidence of an eventual transfor-mation from ritual into the art of puppetry.

It is of interest to see the historical presence of the ritual object getting more and more dissociated from mans body (Kaplin 2001: 2124). This phenomenon has been assisted by the development of technology, from strings, rods, to wireless connection and digitally distributed networks. Ritual objects such as masks were placed directly on the skin providing direct contact with the human body. The point at which the ritual object began to be detached and separated from the body is critical for the author, since this is in fact the point at which the ritual object starts being called a puppet. However, puppets have been parting from their objects for some time, as far as they can, and as far as technology supports, starting with the length of a human arm, progressing on to strings, rods, and finally telematic networks. This dramatically increases the aspect of separation from the ritual object, which is transformed into a puppet through that very process of separation.

In this respect, separation seems to be a critical aspect in the description of what a puppet is. In the romantic sense, it is a process of farewell between the puppet and the puppeteer. The puppeteers gaze and interest creates and reconfirms the distance, coordinating the Z-axis and marking the depth between puppet and puppeteer. The act of distancing always happens on a Z-axis, creating the genuine moment when the beloved and the lover sin-cerely face each other. The puppets departure on this Z-axis, starting from the puppeteers gaze, interest, and love slowly turns the process into the story of love impossible. With digital technology, the puppet is departing on the Z-axis


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into the infinite depth of virtual fields. It is this infinite distance which makes virtual spaces so potentially appealing to human consciousness and the human psyche. Symbolically, virtual spaces would be infinite places for farewell.

Thus the puppet is a ritual object which is continuously parting on the Z-axis from its puppeteer, and his/her leaving is endless in the metaverse, reaching into the virtual realm. It is a new type of farewell, beyond physicality, continuously stimulating mans desire for becoming the other: object, puppet, something alternative. It is a ritual happening on a micro-level of human consciousness. The puppet is a ritual object in relationship with man, involved with mans dynamic mental engagement, which continuously liberates mans body into becoming the other. Puppets life cannot be discussed, without the puppeteer. The puppet truly comes to life in mans consciousness, as in this description by the remarkable Russian puppeteer Sergey Obraztsov:

In reality, no inanimate object can be animated not a brick, rag, toy, or theatrical puppet no matter how expertly it moves when manipulated by a puppeteer. Regardless of circumstances, the objects listed above remain objects lacking any biological features. However, in mans hands any object the same brick, rag, sole of a shoe, or a bottle can fulfill the function of a living object in mans associative fantasy. It can move, laugh, cry, or declare its love.

(Tillis 1992: 23)

There is the wilful engagement as the puppeteer continues in this state of play, as well as the continuous transforming state of the puppet, from inanimate to animate, as well as from animate to inanimate. The puppet as a marginal object revolts against a fixed identity. It is a revolutionary object going beyond the hierarchical structure and endowed with mans powerful mental attachments: mans fantasy, imagination, and suspension of disbelief. We may call this love, especially impossible love, starting from the tragedy of the puppeteer.

THE TRAGEDY OF THE PUPPETEER

The author proposes the term tragedy of the puppeteer in order to address the emotional grief involved in the process of becoming. The tragedy of the puppeteer lies embedded in the ironic process of continuously joining before the farewell. In this scenario, the puppeteer is in love with the puppet, despite all of the definite portents of the upcoming farewell. It is a tragedy because of the puppeteers continuous desire for an impossible relationship. It is the paradoxical aspect of becoming the other. The puppeteer faces the irremediable distance of the puppet and experiences nostalgic for fulfilled moments of integrated unity. The puppeteer laments his/her separation with the puppet who is the symbolic lover, the symbolic dream of oneself forgotten. It is tragic when you recognize the separation from what you love: your lover, dream, puppet, yourself. It would be tragic when you are aware of the upcoming farewell, even when deeply in love. It is the beginning of the story of the love impossible.

Tragedy comes from a paradoxical situation: from continuous denial of the current state, which is part of a problematic state like Hwadu (as previously stated). It is akin to a continuous denial of our own body; we free ourselves to explore alternative places through the puppet, but we always have to return back home to our own bodies situated within a definite socio-economic field. It is the quantum state of paradox.



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Our body has been contaminated and repressed under the micro-politics of power structures: society, hierarchy, and language. We are systematically trained to be better adapted to the formations of power (Guattari 1996: 714.) This is particularly the case with subject-object relationships occurring within a definite socio-economic field, especially one which is socially predefined, promoting certain modes of behaviour and constructing self-observatory systems. In short, the idea of a norm defined by society would be a tremendous obstacle in looking for human freedom and identity.

Felix Guattari talked about the micro-fascism of our own body and the molecular revolution. This is what can also be termed as ritual, one which happens on a microscopic level of human consciousness (Ryu 2005: 105). Ritual celebrates the quantum mode of the self, starting from an ontological or transcendental oppression (Weinstone 2004: 17). During the ritual, we like to prove ourselves to be much more than our definitions, exploring critically different modes of the self. This constitutes a revolution against the power structure, and one which would be impossible to be involved in within our physical state of being. The tragedy of the puppeteer contributes to the ongoing story of the love impossible, an ongoing state of becoming, of being continuously in love with our displaced selves.

Lacan also discusses impossible relations as a never-ending desire for becoming, and a desire for love. As desiring machines we are the main char-acters of the love impossible; we follow the rainbow that cannot be perceived except from a distance. We can only see, feel, and dream about it from a distance. The distance challenges us to look over, standing on our toes, length-ening our neck, and narrowing our eyes, very carefully and longingly, for the eternal process of loving. The author is especially interested in the emotional states happening in this story. Mans broken heart and tears are the very sign of a molecular revolution; in Korea this is called Han, the paradoxical state of consciousness driving the story of the love impossible.

THE MODE OF HAN

Han is well known as the most important characteristic of the Korean mindset and of the emotional states of the culture (Choi 1993: 78). It is a paradoxical state of consciousness that combines an extreme state of grief, caused by physical or mental constraints, with a great hope and strong desire for overcoming the impossible. Han drives dynamic and playful process of the Korean shamanic ritual, Gud. What the kings of the Chosun Dynasty of Korea feared most was to see people looking up to the sky with sighs or tears, since this was per-ceived to be the sign of Han (Kim 1992: 228230). Han calls forth revolution, which makes people look to the sky with fearsome desires for change. As such Han motivates people to look beyond the power structure.

Han has also been considered to be a blood clot, blocking the healthy circulation of energy flow in the body. The way to treat Han is through releasing, rather than through resolving. Critical differences between the two can be explained through comparison of Han and Won. Won () is another emotional state, commonly driving the heroic literature of Asia. For example if ones master is killed by the enemy Won emerges from the servers heart, promising to avenge his/her master and kill the enemy (like Confucious virtue and heroic attitude). Won tries to overcome a distressing situation by eliminating the source of the problem, e.g. through resolving. It projects a linear process with a definite end, often culminating in revenge, animosity, and resentment.


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Figure 1: GO-PU-RI: The process of releasing Han is one of the primary aspects of Korean culture. A scene GO-PU-RI, from a cleansing ritual SSI-KIM-GUD, in Jin-Do, Korea, visually demonstrates the process of releasing Han. In this scene, there are white cloths with seven or nine knots, which represent the Han of the dead person. A shaman releases the knot one after another singing and dancing in grief. This ritual is quite emotional and accompanied by tears and cries, both on behalf of the shaman as well as the audience (Lee 2004: 137).



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Han is predominant in the Korean cultural environment. Quite distinct from Won, Han is the mental state of the non-objective (Kim 2004: 320321), which means acknowledging ones own participation in the entire situation (Choi 1993: 89). This perspective means projecting the sources of problems towards oneself, rather than others. It creates extreme states of grief, weakness, self-accusation, and a sense of futility. It may indeed sound very passive: it is true Han has been primarily discussed negatively in Korea, related to its tragic history of never-ending invasions from neighbouring countries (Han and Han 2007: 8485). However, Han reflects a quantum mind that positions itself as part of a problematic interconnected system. Han has an attitude of embracing everything, including difficulties. The role of ritual is to release Han. For the author it is the essential aspect of the Korean shamanic ritual.

Korean writer Ji-ha Kim highlights the essential quality of Han as passive activeness in his book Hwang-To, where he uses a lotus flower as a metaphor for the endless flow of love.

The lotus flower is born in morasses of mud. It has hidden meaning of life, transparent, endless wandering, disappointment, frustration, and discouragement. It is always abandoned but always loves with endless passion toward the world, toward human, toward all things

(Kim 1970: 101)

It is an endless flow of love and process, through constant pain, grief and difficulties arising from the state of paradox. It is an infinite process of loving. It is unconditional and eternal. Han shows a way to live with problems but with great hope and strong belief, asserting with a soft but powerful voice, not yet but some day! Korean scholar Eeo-Lyeong Lee supports this opti-mistic sense of Han, saying Han cannot be shaped without a strong desire to overcome the situation (Lee 1982: 923). Han gives one the courage to deal with pain, even magnifying it for the ritual. Yeol-Gyu Kim said Han is the necessary condition to heighten the extreme state of playfulness called Shin-Myung, showing the other side of Han, and how opposite emotional states can contrast, balance and indeed transform into each other (Kim 1986: 123133). Han is a sense of grief but also a sense of joy. It is a cry but also a laugh. It is the soft but very powerful energy of creation.

VIRTUAL PUPPET, MY LOVE IMPOSSIBLE

It is interesting to what an extent impossible love stories are omnipresent in Korean culture, represented in its music, drama, movies, and literature. These stories have heartbreaking and tearful storylines, which tend to make people emotionally involved and immersed, crying and laughing at the story. In a traditional setting, impossible love stories often incorporate the class conflicts present within Confucianism society, dealing with the illegal marriages between different classes. This represents one of the examples of mans struggle with impossible relationships. In these stories it is Han that drives the story of the love impossible, presented in the diverse layers of human oppression, from micro to macro scales, and from invisible to vis-ible layers. The author proposes Han within the puppeteers consciousness, embedded in a tragic moment of recognizing the unavoidable obstacle, but nonetheless with a strong wish to overcome it. As previously stated, the puppet is seen as a ritual object continuously separating on the Z-axis of space. As the


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puppet gets further away from the puppeteer, the depth of Han increases. The level of grief and tragedy is overwhelming, and therefore the ensuing ritual is all the more tearful and powerful.

It is interesting to see that technology has supported the farewell between puppet and puppeteer, maximizing the distance for challenges and an increased state of Han. Technological development has been dedicated to the critical quality of ritual object, continuously parting on the Z-axis of the virtual realm, the metaverse, over the network, over the rainbow, over the horizon. We seem to be drastically increasing the height of the cosmic tree connecting and also disconnecting the separated poles, reflecting mans increased desire to tell the dramatic story of love impossible.

This author is fascinated by virtual space in terms of the infinite depth of the Z-axis found therein. Virtual puppets travelling on such a vast Z-axis would be new ritual objects in the context of the love impossible, becoming more and more remote, intangible, flexible, deconstructed, multiplied, and fragmented, challenging us with new types of distances. The quality of the distance presented by the virtual puppet is not only physical, but also psychological. There is a level of uncannyness arising from the paradoxical conflict between life and death, and also between materiality and immateriality. The distance between the virtual puppet and the puppeteer is far greater than the one found in a traditional setting, with regards to the physical as well as to the mental aspects.

Virtual space is an infinite stage for the enactment of the love impossible. It is a space for creating Han, and also releasing Han. The virtual puppet as the agent of the love impossible laments the gap between virtual and real pres-ence. Despite pain and difficulties, the author chooses to address Han rather than hiding, encouraging rather than discouraging. However, the greatest sadness possible would be to lose the sensation of distance, the disconnection and the love impossible, to lose the sense of ourselves as human beings strug-gling with power structures, to lose the ability to experience powerlessness, to really cry: to lose the ability to feel Han. Could it be that we are the main characters of the story of the love impossible? Without feeling the tragedy, how can we cry or laugh with the story? Without feeling the distance, how can we dream of revolution?

The author sees her virtual puppet as an agent of the story of the love impos-sible, proposing a taller cosmic tree, and deeper Han, for a heightened process of the ritual. Her virtual puppetry proposes Han, embracing conflicts, difficul-ties, and the distance of virtual/actual presences, traditional/digital media, and human computer interaction. The virtual puppet performance Parting on Z explored Han in the paradoxical relationships between the virtual puppet and the puppeteer via the distance between avatar and user symbolic lovers facing each other, continuously exchanging dialogues of love and farewell. The story chosen for this performance was the farewell scene from Chun-Hyang-Ga , the classic Korean impossible love story that demonstrates Han.

VIRTUAL PUPPET PERFORMANCE PARTING ON Z

Parting on Z was a virtual interactive puppetry performance enacted at The Project Room for New Media, Chelsea Art Museum, New York, on 27 May 2009, working with the puppeteers voice, weight balance, and facial tracking.

Parting on Z connected virtual puppetry to the traditional Korean oral storytelling performance known as pansori. Pansori is a Korean traditional folk play/one person opera. The pansori master plays all characters for the duration



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of an oral storytelling performance. Pansori consists of singing (SORI), speech (A-NI-RI) and body-motions (BAL-LIM). It is a combination of throat sing-ing and oral storytelling play, and was originally performed by nomadic folk artists who belonged to the lowest class of society deeply in the mode of Han, and who were prosecuted and mistreated. Pansori masters undergo a rigorous training in order to achieve the level of quality in throat singing, which projects Han into the texture of the voice, which is rough, emotional, and appealing. Literally, Pan means space for play or situation play and Sori means singing (Yoo 2005: 143144).

Unlike traditional settings which promise clear visibility, Parting on Z positioned the audience in a difficult spot when it came to following both the virtual puppet and the puppeteer simultaneously, since they were located between the virtual puppet and the puppeteer was placed at opposite ends of the space, with a long distance in between. Thus the audience had to turn their head and choose one of the embodiments, whilst retaining the other in their memory or their imagination. The story was orally told in Korean, without direct English translation. It explored the meta-layer of communica-tion by providing a set of keywords instead of the verbatim translations of the original dialogue from Korean into English. Considering oral storytelling as a transformative creation of narrative continuously imagined, evolved, and generated by listeners, keywords allowed the audience to navigate through and compose their own storytelling. Speed and display of text generation was

Figure 2: The virtual puppet, Mong-Ryong, from virtual puppet performance Parting on Z.


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determined by the puppeteers voice input through a wireless microphone. A sample of the keywords and the text generated:

farewell, many thoughts, cannot help crying, what can I do, so many thoughts, random thoughts, thinking about past, a brave man, even heroes cried, awkward, cry for farewell, tears, walking and walking, hold back tears, distraught.

Parting on Z invited the pansori master, Junghee Oh, to be the puppeteer interacting with the virtual puppet on a large projection in real time. The puppeteer interacted with the virtual puppet, which faced her but at quite a distance, speaking back her story in real time mimicry, and mirroring her body in swaying motions. She stood on a Nintendo Wii Balance board, transmitting her balance signal to the virtual puppet within the virtual space in order to steer, breathe and walk as her reflection. The sound input of her oral storytelling through the wireless microphone motivated the mouth, body and facial expression of a three dimensional virtual puppet in real time. The virtual puppet constantly spoke and sang back to the puppeteer, very much akin to an echo or a mirror reflection. The audience was physically and spiritually located between the spiralling interactive dialogues of the virtual puppet and the puppeteer. The puppeteers face was tracked and video-captured in real time, and projected onto the virtual puppets face at the climax of the performance.

Parting on Z demonstrates Han through the classic Korean impos-sible love story: Chun-Hyang-Ga. It uses the most tearful and saddest scene of farewell between lovers, Chun-Hyang and Mong-Ryong. Through usage

Figure 3: Symbolic lovers, virtual puppet and puppeteer, from Parting on Z.



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of this poignant tale Parting on Z demonstrates Han not only through the literary side of the impossible love story, but also through the relationship of the virtual puppet and the puppeteer in a meta-layer. Parting on Z is, in fact, an impossible love story between symbolic lovers: a virtual puppet and a puppeteer who shape a continuous dialogue of love and farewell, over a distance. This meta-layer is slowly revealed throughout the performance. The perform-ance starts with two virtual puppet characters clearly distinct from each other,

Figure 4: The virtual puppet, mapped with live video of the puppeteers face, from Parting on Z.


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however, their monologues and dialogues start mixing and confusing one another, breaking the traditional narrative, then the virtual puppet appears with the puppeteers lively captured face, creating the inner dialogue of the puppeteer herself.

CONCLUSION

This article has investigated the potential relationship between human and virtual bodies, avatars and their users, in a paradoxical manner: using a story of the love impossible to discuss the concept of love, a story of distance and dema-terialization to discuss the concept of becoming, and a story of disconnection to discuss the concept of connection. Paradox seems to be a key issue in address-ing the complicated relationships that come about in multiple realities both real and virtual when compounded by the emotional engagement of human experience. The author has found the extreme state of paradox to be a key aspect of her own Korean culture, embodied by the concept of Han as the paradoxical state of the human psyche, initiated from the micro-politics of body.

It is to be hoped that the virtual puppetry project will provide a platform to further discuss human perception, sensation and consciousness, through the usage of paradoxical means. In this context, virtual puppetry would be dedicated to broader pursuits such as art, education, therapy, psychology, and philosophy. The virtual puppet would be a paradoxical object against its own definitions, putting the self into ongoing enquiries of being, identity and desire. It would be a ritual object continuously departing on a Z-axis, exploring the complexities of human nature that might become neglected at this highly technology-driven moment in time. Micro-relationships between subject and object can be seen to be the points of trajectory for molecular rev-olutions, which may affect real change at the macro level of human existence. Three-dimensional, socially interactive virtual worlds such as the metaverse, with their integral agents and the puppet embodied as avatar, seem to possess great potential to begin this tearful ritual.

REFERENCES

Baird, Bill (1965), The Art of the Puppet, New York: Macmillan.Choi, S. (1993), Korean Psychology of Shim-Jung: Phenomelogical understan-

ding of Jung and Han, Dae-Wei Symposium, Seoul: Korean Psychological Association.

Digital International Buddhism Organization (2009), Overview of Hwadu Meditation, http://buddhism.org/board/read.cgi?board=Hwadu&y_number=68&nnew=2. Accessed December 2009.

Guattari, Felix (1996), Soft Subversions, New York: Semiotext(e).Han, M. and Han, S. (2007), Cultural Psychology of Shin-Myeong, Korean

Journal of Psychology, 26: 1.Kaplin, Stephen (2001), A Puppet Tree. Puppets, Masks, and Performing objects

(ed. John Bell), New York: New York University and Cambridge, MA.: Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Kim, J. (1970), Hwang-To, Seoul: Han-Er Press.Kim, J. (2004), Interpreting Han in the perspective of Hope Philosophy,

Philosophy, 78: 2, Seoul: Korean Philosophical Association.Kim, Sang Yil (1992), Hanism, Seoul: Onuri Press.Kim, Y. (1986), Korean, who we are?, Seoul: Jayou Moonhak Publisher.



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Lee, E. (1982), Culture of Releasing in Shin-Ba-Ram, Seoul: JoongAng Daily Newspaper.

Lee, E. (2003), Culture of Releasing in Shin-Ba-Ram, Seoul: Moonhak Sasang Publisher.

Meadows, Mark Stephen (2007), I- Avatar: the culture and consequences of having a second life, London: New Riders.

Ryu, Semi (2005), Ritualizing Interactive Media, from Motivation to Activation, Technoetic Arts, 3.2.

Shershow, Scott Cutler (1995), Puppets and Popular Culture, Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

Tillis, Steve (1992), Toward an Aesthetics of the puppet: Puppetry as a theatrical art, Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.

Weinstone, Ann. (2004), Avatar Bodies: A Tantra for Posthumanism, Minneapolis, USA: University of Minnesota Press.

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SUGGESTED CITATION

Ryu, S. (2010), Virtual puppet, my love impossible, Metaverse Creativity 1: 1, pp. 115127, doi: 10.1386/mvcr.1.1.115_1

CONTRIBUTOR DETAILS

Semi Ryu received a BFA from the Korean National University of Arts and an MFA from Carnegie Mellon University. She is an associate professor in the Department of Kinetic Imaging at Virginia Commonwealth University. She is also a media artist who specializes in experimental three dimensional anima-tions and virtual puppetry based on Korean shamanism and the oral tradi-tion of storytelling. Her works have been widely presented at exhibitions and performances in more than fifteen countries, and her academic papers, which have focused on the ritualization of interactive media, have been published in international journals and conferences. Her virtual puppetry was recently performed at Chelsea Art Museum, New York. She is currently writing a chapter for Point of Being (editor: Derrick de Kerkhove, Cambridge Scholars), and is a senior advisor for the project Avatars for virtual heritage funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Contact: 2144 Ridgefield Green Way, Richmond, VA 23233, USA.E-mail: [email protected]: www.semiryu.net


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