Cath Styles
I am currently a PhD candidate at the University of Technology Sydney where I am undertaking a practice-based investigation into embodied interactivity in digital art works. I graduated with a Masters of Social Development from the University New South Wales where I focused on digital story telling and the use of digital media for advocacy.
I am a digital media artist, interaction designer and Zen Yoga Therapist. My creative practice encompasses a number of mediums including photography, video, sound, and interactive media.
My research practice explores innovative ways of engaging the public with issues of forced displacement. I have focused on digital interactivity in projects with humanitarian organisations where I have worked extensively with asylum seekers and refugees.
I was born and bred in Belfast. Now based in Sydney, I have also worked in Brazil, Bangladesh, Thailand, Ireland and the UK. Having lived in cities most of my life I have an interest in sustainable solutions for urban living. I am active in an inner Sydney initiative called Food For the Future.
The National Museum’s kSpace is almost 10 years old, and we have a new director who’s keen to take the Museum into the future. It’s surely only a matter of time before we are invited to reimagine this techno space for kids. THATCampers, I would love for us to devise a killer plan for a new kSpace.
I have emanated a few hazy ideas to that end…
Rather than proposing a space dedicated to any single activity, it makes good sense to design a platform that could host an evolving range of activities.
How about an alternate reality game that involves venturing out to the otherwise strange and somewhat isolated Garden of Australian Dreams, which is just outside the door to this space, and then draws people back in for the resolution?
Or a networked, sensate grid that could transform a group of, say, 121 people into a cellular automaton?
Some parameters we might like to bear in mind – to raise some issues, not to reduce the field of possibility:
- works for groups of between 15 and 120 people
- engages school-aged kids at every level
- relates to Australian culture / history / environment
- involves a challenge of some kind – not entirely shallow
- is non-prescriptive – so the experience is engaging and variable for repeat visitors
- can be enjoyed in as little as 12 minutes
Educators, designers of all kinds (interaction, experience, game, built environment, digital), historians, and anyone else – are you interested? Please use the comment box to express!
Perusing the applications for THATCamp Canberra, I am a bit daunted – but mostly excited – by the experience, skills, interests, passions and quests of people keen to come. What an amazing gathering it will be. Soon, we’ll publish a profile for each participant, and start talking about what we’ll do at the Camp.
Until then, behold the wordle.
Once more, for the more horizontally-oriented Campers:
