Mia Oldham
‘The Fluidity of Data’ explores ideas of big data, network theory, and the gap between computational and algorithmic processes and human thinking and movement. ‘Fluid data’ is explored through 3D rendered wave textures, both as an ocean that we as an audience are submerged in, and as a distant floating object. The transience of these digital objects is considered as Mia inserts herself as a subject, and combines motion capture technologies with dance. These natural human rhythms can therefore align with completely digitally processed and rendered movement, ranging from GIF overlays from archived GeoCities websites from the 1990s, to the different renderings of water within 3D software. Mia’s work therefore questions our human position within this networked condition, and considers whether the human can only ever pass into the virtual as abstracted data.
our navigation of the net is filtered by our preconditioned perceptions of the world. the network is a world of entanglements and connections. artificial spheres of existence. multiplying connections. a seamless web. ephemeral data. readable file formats encrypted to plain text. translated beyond recognition. wireframes spill onto the floor. bodies move across mediums and softwares to new screens. alternate truths and conspiracy. big data is our all-seeing God. echo-chambers and filter bubbles. Cambridge Analytica. the Intellectual dark web. the familiar blue white light. we drown in temporary + dubious data pools. digital algorithms partake in the software nature of the mind. in our looping culture we move like low resolution GIFs. are we in free-fall or stammering time? rendering our bodies as water. we as humans can only pass into the virtual as abstracted data. we run filtered through algorithms. but there’s unauthorized emotional connection. we are dehumanized in the process of dissolving into data. AI dancing replicates human movement. a grating, uncomfortable mindfulness. we are expelled from our environment, our world, our globe, altogether. a process of separation. new horizons open. both transparency and depth. we exist temporarily in worldless suspension. to dwell within a virtual other world. but the world would not be moving so fast if it didn’t have to constantly outrun its own collapse. as we accelerate, we deteriorate. one doubts whether we could be called an image at all. we no longer need substance. transience + impermanence are our only options. techno-capitalism sells us sleep apps to cure the sleeplessness it inflicted on us. there’s no turning back. an inescapable subconscious. there is no off button. there are no longer meaningful connections. these worlds do not belong to us.
