limiteazero: dialogue between the physical and the digital
Limit: mathematical concept based on the idea of proximity, basically used to give values to certain functions in points where no value is defined, so that they can be coherent with the nearest ones.
The 0006_Limiteazero exhibition celebrates the Limiteazero creativity. Limiteazero is an architecture, media design and media art studio based in Milan founded by Paolo Rigamonti and Silvio Mondino. Limiteazero is the only Italian studio invited to the Wired NextFestival06 and at Ars Eletronica 2006, Linz. Their areas of expertise include: creative-network-software design, exhibition and interaction design, media in architecture and public space, sound design. Limiteazero's experimental activity concerns the exploration of alternative relations between man, machine and environment, bridging the physical and the digital, the space and senses, always in touch, always in dialogue.
This exhibition shows their capability to re-think software, trying to express the everyday but still complexly layered relationship between man and machine through six installations (Laptop_orchestra, A_mirror, bb_write, min_mod, The remains of you, Order and Chaos). The work is focused on the investigation of forms and images generated by mathematical processing and through random evolution processes. The "random" sequence is their most used coding expression, and it seems to us very close to a spontaneous dialogue. We enjoyed very much the 0006_limiteazero exhibition and so we decided to call Paolo Rigamonti and ask him some questions.
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Q: You like very much the random sequence. Is it possible to guarantee dialectic in the dialogue between man and machine? How?
A: In the binary relation between man and machine we are fascinated by the machine. Its role. Our interactive installations are always elementary ones, quite unrefined because the polished result does not interest us. To use the random element, the random sequence has one goal: to take away from the human the possibility of controlling the machine. We like the idea of giving a sequence of orders to the machine (orders that can be modified from a random choice of values and variables to be assigned). This means that for every process you can get infinitly varied results, it is a form of repetitive stupidity that contains an incredibly refined intelligence.
Q: Why limite a zero?
A: It is a reference to the mathematical concept of limit. We liked the idea of having in our name an explicit reference to the dry numeric scientific field, not frills, no concession to ornament. It is an abstract mathematical concept, rich of aesthetical features. The limit is a search of sense within a system of abstraction. By the way, this concept is very similar to our way of working: to start from a reference system (the technology) and then to try to establish and set values in specific points.
Q: In 2005 you made a beautiful installation, bb_write, commissioned by BlackBerry® at SMAU, Milan which represented the attempt to build a spatial version of the 'always on' experience, the permanent online connection that is also a connection between the 'physical' and the 'digital', dynamic and reactive like a single organism. To be always in contact and to be always in the world is what makes the human experience special, its perception. That is more than the one of the machines that have an on/off system. To be always connected, to be always on, does it increase or decrease our perception of the world?
A: bb_write should be considered as a simple “scenic representation” of the concept of "always on". In almost all the things we do we try to keep some distance between the object and the opinion on the object we have represented. We try to “freeze” and represent some processes rather than to interpret them. To try not to take a precise position is one of the added values of our work.
0006_Limiteazero c/o Hublab Gallery Via Vigevano 43, Milano (entrance from via Sartirana) March 8th - April 10th 2006
(top image: Laptop_orchestra; bottom image: bb_write. photo by agostino osio)
text and interview by SaraManazza