Rafael Lozano-Hemmer Illuminates the human body through a BMW I7
Art Basel in Motion Part 2: Pulse topology uses programming to consider light and sound
The work of Rafael Lozano-Hemmer on view at Superblue in Miami challenges the perception of sound and light used in dark spaces. It’s a current that’s long been embedded in his data driven work, but took on meaning when an electric BMW i7 was thrown into the mix.
Lozano-Hemmer, who was born and raised in Mexico, engages in biometric methodology to realize his work. What happens to our bodies in motion in dark spaces? What about riding around in the backseat of a vehicle? How do all those sensors impact feeling? How do our emotions and core rhythms interact? The work in his show addresses many of these questions. When we look at cars, day driving is the first setting that comes to mind, but as relevant to our lived experience is what happens when we drive at night.
“I think of these experiences as incomplete, and only with a passenger can you complete the experience. It’s tailored to the participant, and reacts to the participant and its a reflection of them,” he said, and explained how the BMW I7 interior is tailored to a digital experience.
““You hear your heart beat syncopating,” ”
From thousands of lightbulbs hung with precision in Superblue, at first glance the interior installation is bathed in light. But beneath the surface, are sensors that record heartbeats. He filters the heartbeat as tones that reverberate. It’s not a new direction for Lozano-Hemmer who has been building this software-driven art since 2006. As a writer whose spent the last decade writing about all the sensors used in modern vehicle, I appreciated this twist.
He uses this photoplethysmography process to capture heartbeats in an actual BMW I7 at Superblue as well. Using Bluetooth, cameras and HMDI outputs, the pulses control lights and sound. BMW engineers and designers informed Lozano-Hemmer’s perspective on this latest iteration of “Pulse Topology” which first debuted in Basel, Switzerland and will be on view at Superblue until next August. What’s most striking is two heartbeats beating side by side, at once. “You hear your heart beat syncopating,” he says. Lozano-Hemmer’s work has long been at the intersection between art, tech, and the Latin-American experience, questioning where its all going, following the pulse.