record

Thesis Info

LABS ID
00026
Thesis Title
Erotecha: Electronic Intimacy in the Computer-based Interactive Narrative
Author
Brigid Costello
2nd Author
NULL
3rd Author
NULL
Degree
Master of Visual Arts
Year
1999
Number of Pages
63
University
University of Sydney
Thesis Supervisor
Geoffrey Weary
Supervisor e-mail
NULL
Other Supervisor(s)
NULL
Language(s) of Thesis
English
Department / Discipline
Electronic Temporal Arts
Languages Familiar to Author
English, French, Indonesian
URL where full thesis can be found
NULL
Keywords
interactivity, narrative, computer art
Abstract: 200-500 words
The marriage of narrative and computer interactivity creates a form that is dialogical, performative and ephemeral. This has an effect both on the structures and techniques of narrative and on the sources of emotional pleasure and engagement that a narrative produces. The way that narrative is mapped onto the spatial rather than the temporal form of an interactive work, foregrounds the ‘story’ of narrative comprehension and also the relationship between author and interactor. The intimacy between the interactor and the ‘interactive other’ of the computer becoming, therefore, a primary source of emotional engagement within an interactive narrative. The vitality that the ‘interactive other’ gains from the nature of the computer, from the ‘voice’ of the author and from the projected/reflected ‘voice’ of the interactor creates much of the intensity of the narrative experience. This intensity stems from the way that the fusion between the inanimate and the animate within the ‘interactive other’ creates both conscious and unconscious voyeuristic, epistemic and narcissistic pleasures/anxieties. It also stems from the way that the ‘interactive other’ is embodied within the computer and from the tensions between presence/absence, fantasy/reality and public/private that this produces.