31.03.06 Ten-sided, ten identities in a blog.
Ten-sided is a project based on a blog (programmed using the r-Planet free software developed by Joel Watson, Phil Hagelberg e Andre Arko), that invited ten international artists (among them Francis Hwang) with very different attitudes, that have in common the will to experiment with the potential of the medium. Every author was asked to create his character / avatar, in order to participate to the blog collectively created narrative. All the authors are interconnected through their avatars in a interactive mode, with rules not yet established. What comes out is a free improvisation, a sort of literary jam session, that exploit the different nature of the virtual communities as a creative boost. In this way the blog bypasses its traditional confessional or commentary role. It becomes a tool with which remodeling the author's role, giving up the classic demiurgic conception and supporting a creative process that becomes active only through a participatory mode. In this way the sense of belonging and sharing in an emotional circle is opposed to the telematic person's mental nomadism, intended as the moving of his mental reference points from an organized state to a fluid and amorphous one. The concept of 'technopresence' is a crucial node of the project, based on the phatic need to know that the online communication channel is always open. So, on one hand it allows us to be always virtually present, but on the other hand, thanks to the avatar, it allows what can be defined as 'identitarian mimesis', not based on the physical contact or on rationality, but based only on the sharing of the instant.
Francesca Tomassini