Another Body in the World: Flusserian Freedom in Mixed Reality

TL;DR

The paper revisits Flusser's claim that media mediate our access to the world and that freedom emerges only by contesting the program of apparatus, applying this to Mixed Reality. It introduces Surrealism Me, an MR artwork that provides a virtual body and multisense embodiment to reveal that MR projections are not the real world. The authors implement a dual strategy of playing against the AI-driven motion program and of immersive FPV visualization to preserve and extend Sense of Embodiment. A crowd-sourced MR mapping workflow and an AI_motion database enable unpredictable human input to continuously evolve the virtual body and its actions. The work highlights the potential for users to recognize media domination and move toward Flusserian freedom within contemporary digital infrastructures.

Abstract

In Flusserian view of media history, humans often misperceive the world projected by media to be the world itself, leading to a loss of freedom. This paper examines Flusserian Freedom in the context of Mixed Reality (MR) and explores how humans can recognize the obscuration of the world within the media (i.e., MR) and understand their relationship. The authors investigate the concept of playing against apparatus and deliberately alienating the perception of the projected world through an artwork titled "Surrealism Me." This artwork enables the user to have another body within MR through interactive and immersive experiences based on the definition of Sense of Embodiment. The purpose of this work is to raise awareness of the domination of media and to approach Flusserian freedom within contemporary technical arrangements.

Figures (8)

• Figure 1: Imitating the user's body.
• Figure 2: MR technology work in practice.
• Figure 3: Create new site function and crowd-source the infrastructure.
• Figure 4: Placement of the virtual body (to MR).
• Figure 5: Virtual body in the MR environment. Screenshot of Surrealism Me.