Interfaces are a big part of social activities and interactions in the post-digital age. They are proxies for cultural expression and social participation. As the first embodiment of humans in cyberspace, the mouse and keyboard represent our presence, agency, and avatars in dealing with interfaces. These simple devices have become more functional than our physical bodies. While interfaces shape many aspects of our lives, they are always based on an instrumental approach of command, control, and response which is the opposite of dynamic, entangled, and emergent interactions found in nature.
“Exterface” is an audiovisual system by Arash Akbari that experiments with a causal relationship with interfaces instead of the conventional interaction approach in HCI research. The performer’s inputs while interacting with other interfaces are fed into a custom-developed audiovisual interface in real-time to create a composition without the direct control of the performer.
