BLACK BODY RADIATION:
RESCRIPTING DATA BODIES 

is collaborative project between performance artist Ama BE and digital artist Ameera Kawash. The performance explores tobacco as ritual, material, adornment, and value- drawing from West African masquerade traditions for its form.

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For the performance, Ama BE is fitted with three body sensors that measure her heart rate, blood oxygen levels, and body temperature. Through a wearable mini-computer, body metrics are uploaded onto a server where they interact with algorithmic and blockchain architectures. At specified thresholds, embodied digital assets become blockchain-based digital artworks or performance-based NFTs.   

 

The digital design centers artistic agency and digital architectures of choice, opening alternative channels for documenting and funding performance artworks. Through the innovative use of body sensor networks and blockchain architectures, the work rescripts data bodies as agential and intimate forces extending form the performer's body and are not digitally dispossessed. 

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'Black Body Radiation: Rescripting data bodies'  currently exists as a rehearsal and a proposition. The artists will be raising funds and support to realise the project in full. 

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'Black Body Radiation: Rescripting Data Bodies' is on view at the RCA2022 show at the Royal College of Art in London until September 28th. 

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