Hello, my name is Mascha Beuthel and I am presenting today “Experiencing Distance:
Wearable Engagements with Remote Relationships". This work was done in collaboration with Philippe
Bentegeac, Verena Fuchsberger, Bernhard Maurer and Manfred Tscheligi. Families, friends and
partners are increasingly living in a physical distance from each other or are unable to
meet in person, due to work requirements, political circumstances, a global pandemic
or life choices. There are already various connected artefacts, games, tangible interfaces
and wearables existing that aim to bridge and overcome that physical distance, and make
remote living people feel closer or more connected. In this pictorial, we focus on the more negative
experiences encountered when being far apart from loved ones, such as not being able to
exchange physical touch or hugs, not being able to be part of each other’s daily life
and, also experiencing negative emotions, like loneliness, missing one another, feeling
left-behind, isolated and detached. We engaged with such experiences in a qualitative study
where we conducted interviews with family members that live far apart from each other.
Their personal stories where the inspirational starting point for exploring the space of
negative experiences of remoteness. We decided to materialise their insights and personal
stories into a wearable form, which, concurrently, makes their experiences wearable and also
experienceable to others. The results are these wearable artefacts.
We created two pairs of artefacts. One pair is called BREATH, it embodies the lack of
bodily presence and the fear of loosing physical closeness to the remote other, the other pair
embodies the lack of physical, bodily interaction between people that live far apart, it is
called WARMTH. The two artefacts of each pair are connected to each other through Wi-Fi,
and they can sense each others proximity and then react to the distance between them. The
aim was to deliberately not create interactive artefacts that would bridge or playfully overcome
the distance. Instead we contribute material manifestations, in the form of wearables,
of the melancholic, negative and sad emotions of living remotely .
To make these artefacts, we engaged in an iterative design and making process that builds,
for example, on sketching, practices from textile craft, sewing and fashion design,
and explorations with various physical materials and electronics. We also constantly involved
our own bodies into the making process, meaning we tried and experienced how the prototypes
of the wearables would feel and behave on our bodies and our skin. The outcome are the
two pairs of artefacts that appear rather fragile, delicate, and to be handled with care. They
are representing the fragility of remote relationships. One of the pairs is BREATH. When people live
in a distance, they are unable to feel, smell, sense and experience the other person, such
as getting an impression of their well-being, their aliveness, and their body. All of these
experiences are embodied in BREATH. It is a wearable manifestation of the fear of loosing
emotional and physical closeness in remote relationships. BREATH consists of two artefacts
that are connected to each other through Wi-Fi. They can detect their proximity through an
RFID sensor and a tag that are placed inside the wearables. They have servo motors attached
on the backside, and these motors enable the light and more transparent fabrics in the
front of the artefacts to move. This movement should remind of human breath.
When the two artefacts are co-located, like in this video, the motors and the textiles
move, and it seems like they are breathing, or like they are alive. But when they are
physically dislocated from each other, the movement decreases, gradually, and the materials appear
to loose life until the breathing stops completely. The other pair is called WARMTH. Not being able to
meet in person means also not being able to feel and hug the other person. The lack
of bodily touch was very often discussed with our interviewees as one of the major aspect
that can not be replaced through a phone call or a video chat. WARMTH manifests that lack
of closeness, of bodily touch and the missing of interactions with a distant other person
through decreasing and disappearing heat. The two artefacts are also connected through
Wi-Fi, and are able to detect their proximity. If they are co-located, the head pads, that
are indicated on the images as these orange rectangles, they heat up. The heat pads are
located in areas where one would feel the body warmth of another person during a hug,
so in the shoulder, back and neck area. If the artefacts are physically dislocated from
each other, the temperature gradually decreases, and the warmth that one is feeling on the
body is slowly fading away. As I mentioned, the process of making the
artefacts included trying them on our own bodies and on the body of others. We asked
colleagues to wear also the final versions of BREATH and WARMTH, as shown on the images,
which allowed us to gather some initial feedback and reflections. For example, when we were
making BREATH, we spend a lot of time on creating the interplay of the motors, thread, the tension
and fabric pulling to create that breathing effect, and also we spend time on actually
decreasing the movement of the motors on the fabric in the back of the artefacts. But,
when others tried the artefacts, we realised that the movement of the motors was actually
not a problem that we had to fix, but actually, it was feeding into the experience. It even
increased the sensation of breathing and aliveness that is fading, once the artefacts are dislocated.
Concluding I want to highlight that BREATH and WARMTH are material representations of
very personal experiences of living in a distance. By giving such experiences a physical existence,
they can be worn, discussed and experienced by other people. Through this work, we intend
to emphasise that the negative, melancholic and vulnerable experiences of people that
live far apart are a potential and rich design space when designing for remote interactions.
In future iterations, we intend the wearables to be tested and discussed by people that
live in a distance, for example, the interviewees that actually inspired this work. And also,
we want to explore how we can extend the interactivity of BREATH and WARMTH once they are dislocated.
Because currently, the movement and the heat simply stops at some point; and we aim to
further understand how we can design for the time when they are absent from each other
and when they are in a distance. Thank you.