Participation art and the experience of trauma : interactive art as a cathartic process

Abstract

Observing others experience fear can at times be akin to a spectacle, a moment of pleasurable sensations that entertain the body and the brain. By working through a past episode that triggered my own trauma, I aim to interpret my fear through the design of an interactive art installation. The research investigates the relationship between trauma and art; specifically how trauma, through cognitive memory, can be communicated without the use of verbal language but instead through a visual one. In addition this research builds upon psychological theory of post-traumatic stress disorder. It analyses various aspects of how such disorders are transmitted into different work of interactive arts resulting in visual as well as bodily experiences. I will explore how my art installation titled Pigs’ Daunt becomes a vehicle for social interaction amongst the audience, thereby causing diverse experiences and interpretations. Research was also affected within the field of proxemics and reinterpreted in practice through the exploration of the invasion of space of one’s own physical dimension. In order to merge the notion of trauma with psychology, proxemics and art, I refer to a number of theorist writings and works by artists such as Lisa Bennet, Cathie Caruth, Domenick LaCapra, John Dewey, Nicholas Bourriaud, Edward. T. Hall, Roland Barthes, Marina Abramovic, Edward Kienholz, Joseph Beuys, Gary Hill, amongst others. This project will be taking part in a public exhibition set up with fellow Masters’ students of Fine Arts in Digital Arts in June 2014 at St James Cavalier Valletta, Malta.