Universal Everything | Future You

Future You is an interactive digital artwork which displays a reflection of your future self. As the user walk towards the screen that acts like a mirror, a synthetic figure unique to them will appear. The figure starts off as a primitive form, then slowly learning from the user to adapt, suggesting an agile, superior version of the user.

Universal Everything, founded by Matt Pyke, started with him in a shed-cum-workshop. He was a freelance graphic artist but started accepting requests about things he didn’t know how to do. He would then source for people who knew how to do these things and gather other freelancers to collaborate on projects with them. Soon, he began to experiment more with animation and graphic design, and Universal Everything’s works became mostly screen-based, combining art, technology and humanity.

I found ‘Future You’ interesting as it tempts people to walk in front of a screen and make silly gestures just to see what their unique synthetic self would look like, and the process of it evolving to a more complex form. As this was situated at the entrance of an exhibition, I guess people would interact with it and try to figure out what it is but I can imagine this in a more public space like shopping malls or train stations, where people would stop in their tracks just to play around with this interactive artwork.

I couldn’t find much information about this work or what it means, but from the artwork and exhibition title (AI: More Than Human), I believe that the synthetic figure represents AI evolving as we humans feed it information. And, in the future, the AI might evolve into something that is more advanced and could even replace humans. This could be seen when the synthetic figure evolves into a form that is more agile than the human.

I think this artwork is quite meaningful as it leads the viewer directly into the exhibition by letting them experience what an AI could be while they have fun and be silly at the same time. The other viewers around them can also enjoy the artwork while watching them interact with it. I think it is cool that every user will get a unique synthetic figure, making this experience more personalised. If I had a chance, I would like to experience this artwork and find out my unique synthetic self.

Sources:
https://universaleverything.com/projects/future-you
https://www.thisiscolossal.com/2019/05/future-you-universal-everything/
https://segd.org/interactive-reflection-your-future-self-universal-everything
https://www.itsnicethat.com/features/universal-everything-digital-140120