Agnosis: the lost memories...

​Brain-computer interface, artificial intelligence, custom software, digital 3D sculptures, generative book, prints.

2016-09-01

We understand our experience as a sort of layered multimedia stream rendered on the screen of our consciousness. Although a big part of the information acquired through our senses is kept for later retrieval as memories, a fair amount of it is discarded and lost; rendering us absentminded. Absentmindedness: a term describing the phenomena of the loss of memory due to the lack of attention.

Agnosis: the lost memories, proposes a system which adds a technological layer over the human experience. A hybrid composition between the natural and the artificial which augments the default capabilities of the human body-mind apparatus. The system uses a brain-computer interface with an embedded camera, it constantly scans the artist's brain activity and detects moments where his attention drops. Using an array of sensors and the captured brain data, the system is able to register moments of absence, lost memories, both as brainwaves information and images. In parallel, by using consumer grade technologies such as online image recognition services, artificial intelligence and Google search suggestion engine, the system, autonomously, analyzes and interprets these memories.

As a result, all lost memories are rendered as abstract sculptures in a 3D virtual world (digital monoliths) and an autonomously generated log book is produced and printed (machine thoughts / interpretations of the lost memories).