Can’t’ and ‘Won’t’ are the names of these two interactive dresses by Ying Gao. The dresses, made of organza, cotton mesh, PVDF and electronic devices, react to human presence with slowly pulsating movements. Layers of fabric begin to oscillate; the fabric breathing and twitching. Once set in motion, a facial recognition system picks up any signs of emotion in the viewer, and the dresses stop moving. These kinetic garments only reveal themselves to passive onlookers. Their interactivity requires non-interaction. This according to the Artist Ying Gao is ‘out of synch with today’s over-expressiveness’.
In another work, ‘Incertitudes’, Ying Gao adorns two dresses with outward facing dressmaking pins that respond to participant’s voices.
Two other dresses ‘(NO)WHERE’ and ‘(NOW)HERE’, activate with the help of embedded eye tracking technology. Their luminescent threads move with the spectator’s gaze.
Another of Ying Gao’s interactive dresses ‘Playtime’ reacts to being filmed and photographed. The garments change to avoid being recorded. The first dress, a hazy mesh of moving organza, appears blurry when photographed, and the second dress reacts to the flash of a camera, its own light source reflecting back at it.
If you liked this post, check out these organza jewellery works by fibre artist Mariko Kusumoto.
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