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Research

  • Bob Pagani

Bob Pagani, is an old man on Periscope, sleeping. Calling the project “Bob is Sleeping”, he broadcasts himself sleeping from 4 am every morning.  And he doesn’t know why, but every week THOUSANDS of people love to watch him sleep. His guess: “they probably can’t afford Netflix.”

He then started to broadcast his number inviting viewers to leave him voicemails which he would then play them on loop the next day as he sleeps. The voicemails presented many characters including a guy pretending to be a pharmacist and a woman pretending to be Pagani’s “baby mama” asking for child support. How odd.

Pagani also sets up his sleeping scene, decorating it with a VCR, a rubber ducky, some creepy dolls, an LED light. He even has ambient music playing like Frank Zappa album or the live police scanner.

When asked, one loyal fan referred to Pagani as “uncle Bob” and says she finds it relaxing and stops feeling lonely.  Apparently, Pagani fills the void of loneliness and makes dreadful days, better ones – like an old friend talking to you after a shitty day.

  • #SleepingSquad

This sleeping squad is a hashtag movement on YouNow of largely teens, sleeping, getting ready for bed or lounging before bed. An article has been written about how parents should be worrying about their children participating in such activity, as one would think that #SleepingSquad is a peeping tom’s heaven.

In an article written about this, it talked about vanity and how in a weird way, broadcasting yourself sleeping is oddly vain. Simply because, “who would care?” But what kind of vanity would that be inviting predatory viewers to come watch you? What kind of vanity would that be to be putting the most unpolished version of yourself?

These teens actually put themselves out there in risk of potential pedophiles to gain more experience and level up – how creepy.

  • Ice Poisedon

Ice Poisedon was the first twitch livestream I watched, who broadcasted himself sleeping to make money. Apparently, he is not the only one who has the same idea…

He does this by getting his viewers to wake him up. With every “donation”, the livestream makes a noise chosen by the donor. The one I watched played animal sounds, and even some creepy ghostlike song you would typically hear in a horror movie. But he challenges his viewers, and I think this is what makes his viewers so riled up and entertained. In the end, he made a large sum of money of 5k. In another video, he challenged his viewers to top the 5k record.

What a way to trick your viewers to pay you for their own entertainment and all you do is sleep. Somehow this reminds me of hunger games, where people with money pay you to torture you while you sleep and somehow want to intrude that vulnerability and privacy..like its all a game.

  • My project

In my project, I did a livestream of me sleeping. Wearing the hijab posed as an inconvenience to me. Not only was it uncomfortable, but more importantly, I saw it as a visual barrier. The last step I would have to remove in order for my viewers to really experience my full vulnerable self. But when looking back at it, I was probably the first hijabi to be live streaming herself sleeping. And that in itself poses as a new element from the other sleeping livestreams.

It was a symbol of innocence, a protection, a warning, an object that questions people if they should continue watching a girl sleeping in her most vulnerable state. Someone who chooses to cover herself to avoid herself from becoming a predatory victim, has put herself out there to be watched. And the fact that she is unconscious, and cannot see or know what is going on. Would the viewer still continue to push through that visual barrier? What person would that make him to be? I guess I am touching on a topic of morality and self reflection.

As for my friends, they know me, so they were trying to wake me up in the comments. But these viewers are biased in my opinion. And in that way the performance has taken on a completely new meaning.

Research Critique: Telematic Dreaming

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About the Work and Artist

Telematics: the area of technology that deals with sending digital information over long distances using wireless forms of communication

The Third Space: The third space represents the fusion of the physical (first space) and the remote (second space) into a third space that can be inhabited by remote users simultaneously or asynchronously.

Telematic Dreaming

Telematic Dreaming is an artwork produced by Paul Sermon who works a lot with the Third Space with telematics. Noting that this work takes place in 1993, Paul Sermon truly breaks the definition of what is virtual and what is reality.

The work involves two beds 5000 kilometres apart. One bed is in the exhibition space and the other is inaccessible to the audience. Both beds are being recorded with a camera but only the image of Paul Sermon is being projected onto the exhibition’s bed. Here, both artist and the audience are allowed to interact, lie or sit or even touch. Audio is not used in this work in order to prevent the users to use their voice as means of communication.

Using something called ISDN and chroma keying the artist is able to project himself onto the bed.

Paul Sermon also works with other types of telematic settings like the dining table, shower room and the sofa and TV room.

Telematic Encounter

Telematic Vision

Body of Water

How it relates to The Third Space and Me

Firstly, I feel the that the setting of the third place, specifically in Telematic Dreaming, plays a significant role in how the audience feels. The bed, is an understood object across all ages and cultures. It is a symbol of security, comfort, intimacy, privacy, vulnerability.

When confronted with such a complex object, some people may feel afraid to commit to what might happen during the interaction. They are forced to break down their walls, and decide to become vulnerable to be able to experience an intimate connection. Once being able to reach such a level of intimate connection in a public context, they have truly and fully entered and immersed themselves in the third space.

Ironically, in the third space, people usually have avatars and use that to embody another persona. But in Telematic Dreaming, you are forced to be yourself, be “naked” and connect with someone else.

Secondly, this work speaks of the human need to be touched.

In 2009, a DePauw University psychologist, Matthew Hertenstein, demonstrated that we have an innate ability to decode emotions via touch alone. Participants communicated eight distinct emotions—anger, fear, disgust, love, gratitude, sympathy, happiness, and sadness—with accuracy rates as high as 78 percent.

(https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/articles/201303/the-power-touch)

Whether we know it or not, touching forces us to be open to send the receiver emotions and to receive emotions. This form of communicating is direct, fast, and effective. It can affect a person psychologically in a good or bad way. In the third space of this artwork, such complex exchange of communications and feelings are able to take place.

Thirdly, in this artwork, we touch and feel the presence of another, with our eyes. Which is very interesting, because in my last point I said there was an exchange of communication through touching, but to begin with, touching does not actually exist in this artwork. It is amazing how the quickly human body adapts its senses when other senses are not being able to work in a situation.

In relation to me, my boyfriend and I have been calling every night for the past 3 years and “slept together”, I guess, in the third space. In my nightly third space, I experience his presence and touch through what I hear.