36
D. de Paulis
Fig. 6.1 A sampling of Ann Druyan’s brain waves, recorded on June 3, 1977 (Credits NASA)
the 50th Design Biennale in Ljubljana in September 2014. Over the years before its
completion, the project has been widely presented as work in progress at conferences,
festivals, art events, gradually becoming more concrete at each presentation, thus
starting to take shape in the mind of the public longer before its staging at the
Dwingeloo radio telescope in November 2018. The first public presentation of the
project as a live performance was at the GOGBOT new media art festival in Enschede
in The Netherlands, in September 2017, followed by another live performance in
February 2018 as part of the TEC ART international festival in Rotterdam. During
this event, the brain activity of participants was recorded and transmitted into space
as part of a live audio-visual performance, in remote connection with the cabin of the
Dwingeloo radio telescope and in collaboration with radio operators of the CAMRAS
team.
6.2 Conceptual Background of the Project
COGITO in Space is an interdisciplinary, collaborative project and the result of six
years research at the Dwingeloo radio telescope and ASTRON, the Dutch Institute
for Radio Astronomy. The intellectual background of the project grew over the years,
thanks to the contribution of specialists from different fields, however my reasoning
behind it focuses mainly on two concepts: the unresolved question of Mind and Body
Dualism and the Overview Effect. Another important reference was the novel Solaris
by Stanislaw Lem and the homonymous film by Andrei Tarkovsky.
The reasoning around the project began as a reflection upon the use of the electromagnetic spectrum, and especially radio waves, by radio astronomers for gathering data of cosmic phenomena, and upon the type of knowledge we gain from the
discovery of such remote events that cannot be known through direct sensory experience. Working alongside radio astronomers over the years, I had the opportunity
D. de Paulis
Fig. 6.1 A sampling of Ann Druyan’s brain waves, recorded on June 3, 1977 (Credits NASA)
the 50th Design Biennale in Ljubljana in September 2014. Over the years before its
completion, the project has been widely presented as work in progress at conferences,
festivals, art events, gradually becoming more concrete at each presentation, thus
starting to take shape in the mind of the public longer before its staging at the
Dwingeloo radio telescope in November 2018. The first public presentation of the
project as a live performance was at the GOGBOT new media art festival in Enschede
in The Netherlands, in September 2017, followed by another live performance in
February 2018 as part of the TEC ART international festival in Rotterdam. During
this event, the brain activity of participants was recorded and transmitted into space
as part of a live audio-visual performance, in remote connection with the cabin of the
Dwingeloo radio telescope and in collaboration with radio operators of the CAMRAS
team.
6.2 Conceptual Background of the Project
COGITO in Space is an interdisciplinary, collaborative project and the result of six
years research at the Dwingeloo radio telescope and ASTRON, the Dutch Institute
for Radio Astronomy. The intellectual background of the project grew over the years,
thanks to the contribution of specialists from different fields, however my reasoning
behind it focuses mainly on two concepts: the unresolved question of Mind and Body
Dualism and the Overview Effect. Another important reference was the novel Solaris
by Stanislaw Lem and the homonymous film by Andrei Tarkovsky.
The reasoning around the project began as a reflection upon the use of the electromagnetic spectrum, and especially radio waves, by radio astronomers for gathering data of cosmic phenomena, and upon the type of knowledge we gain from the
discovery of such remote events that cannot be known through direct sensory experience. Working alongside radio astronomers over the years, I had the opportunity