Research & Publications
Media studies is a discipline of big questions. It runs a tract through science, engineering, medicine, psychology, art—one would be hard pressed to find a part of the human experience that is not shaped or influenced by media in some way. At the center of this diverse array of perspectives, I believe there is a central question at which we all converge: How does media (and the technologies that make those media forms possible) shape and reflect our human experience?
My research is heavily informed by my experiences as a media practitioner and performer. I build physical instruments for digital performance because I myself have struggled with feelings of detachment and sterility when performing with computational interfaces. I develop and publish evaluation frameworks for multimodal performance systems because I have found no satisfactory way to define and address the limitations of my own instruments. Because I am an active performer and collaborator, I am in a constant dialogue with individuals engaged in design, research, and creative activities, and my research reflects the priorities and interests of those communities.
I am passionate about conducting research in media studies because it is central to my own artistic practice, and also because it is a platform through which I can engage in a discourse about how we express ourselves across a multitude of disciplines and histories. Beyond contributing to contemporary discourses regarding the experiences and struggles of media practitioners, my engagement with these issues connects me to important matters of the future. I have found meaning and inspiration in how my research can reach students and educators and provide educational tools that will help them succeed in the world.
Media studies is full of big questions because we live in a mediated world, where every element of our life is touched, extended, and impacted by the media that surrounds us. My identities as practitioner and researcher are deeply intertwined, each informing and inspiring the other. I am passionate about a continued inquiry into the role that technology plays in our creative human endeavors and an active engagement with the people and communities who bring new and exciting perspectives to the future of human expression.
PhD Dissertation
Risk, while an inherent property of traditional performance, is little understood in the world of digitally mediated performance. Today, musicians often choose to incorporate or utilize digital and computational technologies into their creative processes, from augmenting and extending traditional instruments to the creation of entirely new ones. Though technological developments naturally run alongside novel artistic practices, processes, and products, the relatively recent uptick in the availability and affordability of digital and computational resources has provoked a swift and drastic shift away from highly physical modes of creation to ones which are less dependent on the direct connection between the hand of the creator and the music they create.
This research investigates qualities of physical and material risk within musical performance practices and the value that such properties may hold for less physical engagements afforded by computational instruments. The two studies designed for this research draw upon the experiences of practitioners directly, allowing them to speak about their creative processes, values, and priorities, and how risk and expressivity might factor into their practice. Through comparative studies, artifact design, in-depth discussions, and the application of thematic analysis, I am able to share the perceptions and experiences of practitioners as they themselves describe.
By identifying the value that physical and material risk, uncertainty, and the potential for failure play in the creative process we can potentially provide a compelling argument for the importance of such qualities in practices which do not naturally engage with them. Designing for risk and assessing the experiences of practitioners within the field of experimental media performance will contribute to a better understanding of the value of physical and corporeal materials within digital practices and present potential guidelines for the creation and use of new instruments for creative musical expression.
Conference Publications
Long, Duri, McKlin, Tom, Weisling, Anna, Martin, William, Guthrie, Hannah, and Magerko, Brian. "Trajectories of Physical Engagement and Expression in a Co-Creative Museum Installation." In Proceedings of the 2019 Conference on Creativity and Cognition, pp. 246-257. ACM, 2019.
Co-creative (i.e. collaboratively creative) activities involving physical interaction are becoming more prevalent in museums as a way of promoting opportunities for exploratory learning-through-doing. However, there is still a need for new techniques for understanding how physical interaction relates to engagement and creative expression in order to both evaluate exhibits and iterate on their design. This article reports on a study of how family groups physically interact in a museum environment with a specific co-creative exhibit--TuneTable. We relate observable markers of physical interaction with stages of engagement/expression based in the literature and identify several different trajectories of participant engagement and creative expression as they navigate the exhibit. We explore what these trajectories tell us about the types of inquiry and experimentation that TuneTable supports and discuss design implications. This paper's main contribution is a deep study of how physical markers reveal trajectories of creative engagement within a specific co-creative installation.
Nitsche, Michael, and Weisling, Anna. "When is it not Craft?: Materiality and Mediation when Craft and Computing Meet." In Proceedings of the Thirteenth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction, pp. 683-689. ACM, 2019.
Craft has emerged as an important reference point for HCI. To avoid a misrepresenting, all-encompassing application of craft to interaction design, this position paper first discerns craft from HCI. It develops material engagement and mediation as differentiating factors to reposition craft in relation to tangible interaction design. The aim is to clarify craft's relation to interaction design and to open up new opportunities and questions that follow from this repositioning.
Weisling, Anna, and Anna Xambó. "Beacon: Exploring Physicality in Digital Performance." Proceedings of the Twelfth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction. ACM, 2018.
Live performances which involve digital technology often strive toward clear correspondences between distinct media modes, particularly those works which combine audio and video. Often, the process of creating and executing such performances involves mapping schemes which are encased within the digital system, producing content which is tightly synchronized but with relationships which can feel rigid and unexpressive. Within this paper we present a collaborative process between visualist and musician, which builds toward a method for promoting co-creativity in multimedia performance and prioritizes the performer’s physical presence and interaction with digital content. Through the development of two autonomous systems, a novel physical interface and an interactive music system, we summarize our creative process of co-exploration of system capabilities, and extended periods of experimentation and exploration. From this experience, we offer an early-stage framework for approaching engaging digital audiovisual relationships in live performance settings.
Weisling, Anna, Xambó, Anna, Olowe, Ireti, and Barthet, Mathieu. "Surveying the Compositional and performance practices of audiovisual practitioners." Proceedings of the eighteenth international conference on new interfaces for musical expression (NIME). ACM, 2018
This paper presents a brief overview of an online survey conducted with the objective of gaining insight into com- positional and performance practices of contemporary audiovisual practitioners. The survey gathered information regarding how practitioners relate aural and visual media in their work, and how compositional and performance practices involving multiple modalities might differ from other practices. Discussed here are three themes: compositional approaches, transparency and audience knowledge, and error and risk, which emerged from participants’ responses. We believe these themes contribute to a discussion within the NIME community regarding unique challenges and objectives presented when working with multiple media.
Weisling, Anna, and Anna Xambó. "Beacon: Exploring Physicality in Digital Performance." ACM Interactions Magazine: Demo Hour. 2018.
Xambó, A., Drozda, B., Weisling, A., Magerko, B., Huet, M., Gasque, T., & Freeman, J. (2017, March). Experience and Ownership with a Tangible Computational Music Installation for Informal Learning. In Tangible and Embedded Interaction(pp. 351-360).
In this paper we present a preliminary design and initial assessment of a computational musical tabletop exhibit for children and teenagers at the Museum of Design Atlanta (MODA). We explore how participatory workshops can promote hands-on learning of computational concepts through making music. We also use a hands-on approach to assess informal learning based on maker interviews. Maker interviews serve to subjectively capture impromptu reflections of the visitors' achievements from casual interactions with the exhibit. Findings from our workshops and preliminary assessment indicate that experiencing and taking ownership of tangible programming on a musical tabletop is related to: ownership of failure, ownership through collaboration, ownership of the design, and ownership of code. Overall, this work suggests how to better support ownership of computational concepts in tangible programming, which can inform how to design self-learning experiences at the museum, and future trajectories between the museum and the school or home.
Weisling, A. (2017, June). The Distaff: A Physical Interface to Facilitate Interdisciplinary Collaborative Performance. In Proceedings of the 2017 Conference on Designing Interactive Systems (pp. 1365-1368). ACM.
This paper presents an interface designed for an interdisciplinary collaboration between a visual artist (known within this paper as a "visualist") and electronic musician. With the specific goal of enabling expressive real-time visual performance in conjunction with live electronic music, the interface draws from methodologies and design practices informing interaction design, HCI, and experimental music practices [7, 16, 20]. The affordances and general design techniques of the interface are described, and an initial reflection on the performative experience is presented, considering both the visualist's and musician's perspectives. What begins to emerge from this design experience is a core set of issues and values for performers working with media technology; the Distaff suggests ways we might approach such issues with expressivity, collaboration, and physical engagement in mind.
Weisling, A. (2016, May). the rest is construction: An Interactive Installation Evoking Somatic and Cognitive Effects of Anxiety. In Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems(pp. 3893-3896). ACM.
This paper describes the rest is construction, an interactive installation which seeks to emulate the experience of living with anxiety to a viewer through haptic and visual interactions. The use of haptic and display technologies will be discussed, particularly as they relate to the visual and technological aesthetics of the piece.
Poster Presentations & Demos
Weisling, A. and Xambó, A. “Constructing a Conceptual Framework for Collaborative Audiovisual Performance”. ICCC ’17. Atlanta, GA, USA.
Weisling, A., Xambó, A., Magerko, B., Roma, G., Jacob, M., Bhanu, N., and Freeman, J. “TuneTable: A Tangible Computational Music Installation for Informal Learning”. ICCC ’17. Atlanta, GA, USA.