Understanding Aesthetic Anticipation in Interactive Art CHIANG JING YING NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF SINGAPORE 2015 Understanding Aesthetic Anticipation in Interactive Art CHIANG JING YING Master of Fine Art (MFA) A THESIS SUBMITTED FOR THE DEGREE OF THE MASTER OF ARTS Department of Communications and New Media Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF SINGAPORE 2015 Declaration I hereby declare that this thesis is my original work and it has been written by me in its entirety. I have duly acknowledged all the sources of information which have been used in the thesis. This thesis has also not been submitted for any degree in any university previously. Chiang Jing Ying 28 August 2015 i Acknowledgements First and foremost, I would like to thank my supervisor, Dr. Alex Mitchell, for his support and guidance throughout the process of writing this thesis. I appreciate his patience, timely advice and continual persistence to make the completion of this thesis possible. I would also like to express my gratitude to the examiners, Dr. Denisa Kera and Dr. Anne-Marie Schleiner, for using some of their precious time to assess my thesis during their leave of absence. Thanks to my initial thesis advisory committeemembers,Assoc. Prof. LonceWyseandAssoc. Prof. KevinMcGee, fortheirusefulfeedbackandsuggestions. SpecialthankstoProf. MohanDutta, headoftheCommunicationandNewMediaDepartment,fortakingcareofmore than simply administering the progress of this study. Thank you to Dr. Millie Rivera, the previous head, for supporting my ap- plication into the programme. Thanks to all the members of the Narrative and Play Research Studio for their support and advice in our regular meet- ings. And, most importantly, thank you to Alexandra, Charlotte, and Skylar for always being there and cheering me up when I was down. To my parents, for quietly praying for me, and the Chiang family Whatsapp group for their continual support and encouragement. ii Contents 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Different Approaches to Aesthetics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 1.2 Pragmatist and Everyday Aesthetics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 1.3 Aesthetic Attitude . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 1.4 Interactive Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 1.5 Interactivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 1.6 Scope of Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 1.7 Contribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 1.8 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 1.9 Structure of This Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 2 Related Work 16 2.1 Identifying Aesthetic Theories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 2.2 Approaches to Aesthetic Response in HCI . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 2.3 Approaches to Aesthetic Response in Game Studies . . . . . . . 20 2.4 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 3 Research Problem 22 3.1 Defining Anticipation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 3.2 Anticipation as a Survival Mechanism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 3.3 Studies of Anticipation in Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 3.4 The ITPRA Theory of Expectation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 3.5 Research Question . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 3.6 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 4 Define Aesthetic Anticipation 32 4.1 Temporality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 4.2 Emotional Dimensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33 4.3 Uncertainty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 4.4 Artistic Device . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 4.5 Defining Aesthetic Anticipation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36 4.6 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 5 Method 38 5.1 Art Criticism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 5.2 Adapted Criticisms to HCI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 5.3 Methods Used for Game Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41 5.4 Interaction Criticism and Close Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 5.5 Analytical Lenses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 iii Aesthetic Anticipation in Interactive Art Chiang 5.6 The Interactive Artefacts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 5.7 Mapping of ITPRA to Interactive Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 5.8 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 6 Preliminary Investigation of Interactivity and Aesthetic An- ticipation in Helena 48 6.1 Description of Helena . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49 6.2 Interactivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 6.3 Analysis of Helena using ITPRA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 6.3.1 The Imagination Response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51 6.3.2 The Tension Response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53 6.3.3 The Event Onset . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 6.3.4 The Prediction Response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 6.3.5 The Reaction Response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 6.3.6 The Appraisal Response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56 6.4 Different Experience between Interactive and Non-interactive Art 56 6.5 Four Interactive Issues in Helena . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 6.5.1 Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 6.5.2 Consequences of Actions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 6.5.3 Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 6.5.4 Uncertainty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 6.6 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 7 Loss of Control in Bongcheon-Dong Ghost 61 7.1 Description of Bongcheon-Dong Ghost . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 7.2 Interactivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 7.3 Analysis of Aesthetic Anticipation in Bongcheon-Dong Ghost . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63 7.3.1 The Issue of Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64 7.3.2 The Issue of Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67 7.4 Loss of Control and Aesthetic Anticipation . . . . . . . . . . . . 69 7.5 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70 8 Consequences of Actions in Hush 71 8.1 Description of Hush . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71 8.2 Interactivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72 8.3 Analysis of Aesthetic Anticipation in Hush . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 8.3.1 The Issue of Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 8.3.2 The Issue of Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 8.3.3 The Issue of Uncertainty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 8.3.4 The Issue of Consequences of Actions . . . . . . . . . . . 78 8.4 Aesthetic Anticipation in Hush . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 8.5 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80 9 Delayed Gratification in Shadow of the Colossus 81 9.1 Description of Shadow of the Colossus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81 9.2 Interactivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82 9.3 Analysis of Aesthetic Anticipation in Shadow of the Colossus . . 83 9.3.1 Searching for the Colossi. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 9.3.2 Confronting the Colossi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87 iv Aesthetic Anticipation in Interactive Art Chiang 9.3.3 The Aftermath . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89 9.4 Delayed Gratification and Aesthetic Anticipation . . . . . . . . . 90 9.5 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92 10 Discussion: Control and Aesthetic Anticipation 94 10.1 Different Types of Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95 10.1.1 Control with Dilemma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96 10.1.2 Loss of Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97 10.1.3 Control with Trade-offs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99 10.1.4 Control within Strict Constraints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101 10.1.5 Flexibility in Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102 10.2 Answering the Research Question . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103 10.3 Control as Strategies for Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105 10.4 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106 11 Conclusion and Future Work 107 11.1 Contribution and Significance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107 11.2 Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109 11.3 Future Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110 Bibliography 111 v Summary The use of interactive technologies in art is an important development, as it introducesnewaestheticconcernstothefield. Inrecentyears,asizeableamount of work has been done in an attempt to understand the relationship between aesthetics and interactive art. This work can be categorised into three groups: 1) identifying new theories to discuss the aesthetics of interactive art, 2) under- standingtheinteractor’saestheticresponsethroughHCI,and3)understanding the player’s aesthetic response through game studies. This work has laid the foundation for a new area of research. However, there is still much to be done, and many aspects of this field that have not yet been examined. For example, anticipation is one of the many concerns that has not been looked at in detail. Anticipation is one of the key elements of the processuality, temporality, and interactivity of interactive art. This is because theexperienceofaninteractiveworktendstofocusontheprocess ofactualising thework, ratherthanmerelycontemplatingafinishedproduct. Inthisprocess, the interactor is required to do something, to make choices or take actions, and sees the outcomes of her actions. As such, anticipation is an important driving force not only prior to the event onset, but also in responding to what the interactor has done. This raises the research question that will be addressed in this thesis: how does interactivity contribute to the experience of anticipation as an aesthetic response in interactive art? We will refer to this type of response as aesthetic anticipation. Inordertoexplorethisquestion, thisresearchusesclosereadingtoexamine four selected interactive works: installation art Helena, webtoon Bongcheon- Dong Ghost, serious game Hush, and video game Shadow of the Colossus. The main contribution of this thesis is the suggestion that anticipation as anaestheticresponsecanbeelicitedbyinteractivitythroughthewaysinwhich control,consequencesofactions,time,anduncertainty areinterrelated. Ofthese factors, our findings suggest that control is the most prominent factor. We also identified four distinct ways in which the provision of control can be used to evoke aesthetic anticipation: control with dilemma, loss of control, control with trade-offs, and control within strict constraints. These findings provide insight into the unique ways that aesthetic antici- pation is elicited by interactivity. This can serve as a starting point for the developmentofstrategiesfordesigningandevaluatinginteractiveartefactsthat elicit aesthetic anticipation. More broadly, it provides some initial insight into the relationship between interactivity and aesthetic response. v List of Figures 3.1 Huron, ITPRA Theory of Expectation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 6.1 Helena, Marco Evaristti . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 6.2 ITPRA diagram for Helena . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51 7.1 Bongcheon-Dong Ghost, by Horang . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 7.2 ITPRA diagram for Bongcheon-Dong Ghost . . . . . . . . . . . . 64 8.1 Hush, Jamie Antonisse and Devon Johnson . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 8.2 ITPRA diagram for Hush . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 9.1 Shadow of the colossus, Team Ico . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82 9.2 ITPRA diagram for Shadow of the Colossus . . . . . . . . . . . . 85 vi List of Tables 3.1 Summary of ITPRA response systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 6.1 Summary of actors’ responses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 10.1 Summary of types of control. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96 vii