As part of The Living Planet, our year-long programme which focuses on the non-human, and deals with themes such as climate change, ecology, and communication, the artist collective Keiken have developed a multi-layered participatory project called Augmented Empathy. Developed as a new collaborative commission with FACT’s Learning team, the artists designed a project which mirrors the way we, and specifically young people, learn through the navigation of social media.
Keiken are a cross-dimensional collaborative practice (Hana Omori, Isabel Ramos and Tanya Cruz), whose practice merges the physical with the digital by building online worlds and augmented realities. In Augmented Empathy, the collective explores the subversion of existing tools -in this case, Instagram filters- and how social media can be used as a space for exchange and artistic creation. The result was 4 Instagram filters which can be downloaded and used by anyone.
From these filters, the collective was joined by Sakeema Crook, and also CGI artist Ryan Vautier who creates animated worlds exploring the fractures between the digital and physical, to develop a series of live performances and this film installation. Crook is an international dance artist whose practice explores world-building, intersectionality and carving progressive realms. Visitors are invited to activate and interact with augmented reality pieces, which extend from Sakeema’s body whilst she speaks and performs a continuation of the speech she gave at the recent Black Lives Matter Protests and Black Trans Lives Matter Protests. This performance spreads Sakeema's message, that through the understanding of intersectionality, we can create a new path for fluidity, love and change.
