Mythomachines Suspended, Fallen and Jumping Cyborgs

Abstract

In this text I am presenting the installation and performance project called ‘Automatic bai Chans’ I developed since the spring 2008 mainly in collaboration with Juan Hernández, student of the C: Art: Media Master’s program. We collaborated also with Anna-Sara Åberg from the School of Music and Drama, who brought a valuable input to the project as well. Our initial motivation for the project came from our interest in the jumping rope game. Formally, we became attracted by the connection between the circular movement of the rope while swinging, the sound of the mass of air displaced, and the contrast between the vertical axis of the person jumping and the horizontal axis around which the rope revolves. While reading on the origins of the game we found out about an Easter tradition in the Sussex region, in England, in which people gather to skip the rope as a reminder of the rope Judas used to hang himself after betraying Jesus. We did an automated installation with a suspended figure jumping, and a rope swinging with an envelope and a blank letter attached. We approached the installation elements through physical improvisation leading to the performance work presented. The thesis’ text describes the different projects developed during the master program, referring to analogies as key elements of our creative process. It discusses also the dualism of good and evil in several interpretations of Christianity and the critics addressed to this dualism in The Cyborg Manifesto(1985). I refer to Malinche’ s story as inspiring for the mythic cyborg.