Dinner Party

Dinner Party.

© 2008 Hye Yeon Nam, Photo © Chang Kyun Kim

Dinner Party is an interactive installation, where a single chair and a place set for one person seem to provide a solitary dining experience. However, the installation offers an interaction between oneself and imaginary creatures. As if she or he is about to enjoy a meal, a participant sits down at an interactive table on which are placed several objects that he or she can move. The objects cast virtual shadows on the tabletop, with animated creatures hiding in these shadows.

Among our everyday habits, having a meal is a banal routine. With tabletop technology and computer vision, however, a diner encounters a magical moment where imaginary creatures appear during the meal. Meaningless everyday gestures become meaningful when a participant touches the point of entry into a new world. Dinner Party provides an environment where people meet and interact with Lewis Carroll's "Jabberwocky" (1872), which describes creatures hiding in the shadows. There is a chair, a table, and a table setting for one person's dinner. The table becomes the interactive platform between the participant and the imaginary creatures living in the shadows of the table setting. Creatures move from the main plate's shadow to other shadows while scattering or hiding in between. When the participant waits long enough, the creatures reveal themselves and the "Jabberwocky" poem appears on the table. In our solitary modern society, an imaginary friend is able to make our loneliness disappear.

Hye Yeon Nam is a digital media artist working on audio/video installations in Atlanta and New York City. She is a PhD candidate at Georgia Institute of Technology and holds an MFA in digital media from the Rhode Island School of Design. Crystal Campbell practices poetic design, where the meaning of a product or service is open-ended. She holds an MA summa cum laude in Creative Practice for Narrative Environments (MACPfNE) from Central Saint Martins, London. Carl DiSalvo is Assistant Professor of Digital Media in the School of Literature, Communication and Culture at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He earned a PhD in Design from Carnegie Mellon University in 2006, and was a post-doctoral fellow at the Center for the Arts in Society and the Studio for Creative Inquiry from 2006–2007. Zachary Lieberman teaches at Parsons School of Design. His work uses technology in a playful way to explore the nature of communication and the delicate boundary between the visible and the invisible. Kueiju Lin is the music director of the M.O.V.E. Theater Group (Taipei) and an assistant professor at the National Tainan University of the Arts. She holds a PhD in composition from University of California, San Diego. Martín Nadal is a digital media artist/programmer based in Spain. His collaborative works have been showcased at Ars Electronica 2006, Ars Electronica 2008, eyebeam, MadridMediaPrado, and Noche en Blanco. Jeremy Rotsztain is a Canadian video artist and software developer. He recently completed his Master's degree in Art and Technology at the Interactive Telecommunications Program of New York University.

Dinner Party.

© 2008 Hye Yeon Nam, Photo © Chang Kyun Kim