Newly created avatars without a gender, or any avatar where "clothing is still downloading", are rendered as a cloud rather than naked/wrong body shape ...
created by Quad Anatra in 2008, this installation keeps two identical, standard avatars locked in a box. Based on the fact that everything that happens and exists in the metaverse is influenced by, or even more depending on the real world, these avatars (QuInT and sExT) are run from two instances of SecondLife on one computer - hence the title of the project - split personality. As every sim on the grid corresponds to a server in real life which has to be maintained and supplied with energy, this installation is a way of making these connections and dependences more obvious. Furthermore the work broaches the issue of death, a fact which is ignored to a large extend in this metaverse - the two clones you are watching are bound to their physical counterpart in the real world (which is, by the way, a standard dell dimension 8300 dektop computer) and therefore exposed to possible hardware failure. The server which hosts the two is kept running 24/7 nonstop until one of the components fails, thus ending the existence of the avatars. As from then, they will never resurface since their physical host has collapsed. - Quad Anatra
THE KAMEN VORTEX will be available in First Life and Second Life.
Using a Segway and a portable computer one will be able to control his movement in the metaverse through his movement in meatspace and vice versa. An aesthetic experience can be achieved in both worlds by remaining almost motionless, only using basic digitized gestures (via HIDs such as keyboard, mouse and the shifting of your bodys weight). The primary artefact the asks for the spectators state of aesthetic appraisal is a Second Life environment thats mirrored in a first life photographic artwork. The reproduced subject is a snapshot from moment in the universe-became-metaverse Google Earth. Through the combination of both prothetic media a semiotic paralysis evolves. - Bernhard Grigorovich