George Legardy - Pockets full of memories (2002)

https://gyazo.com/07dc94e81730ba97ce81dbd16588e238

https://vimeo.com/44602943

鑑賞者が自分の持ち物をスキャンするとその画像の特徴量をSOMでクラスタリング、二次元にマッピングしたものがスクリーンに表示される。

Pockets Full of Memories is an installation that explores the workings of collective memory and gives insight into complex data structures. Visitors create an archive by digitizing and describing a personal object they carry with them. Both the object and the description are added to a dynamic database, that allows visitors to establish their own relationships and links. The result is visualized as a large screen projection, and can also be accessed via DEAF03's website

Pockets Full of Memories is both an on-line and on-site installation that explores the topic of collective memory and gives insight into complex data structures. Visitors to the installation contribute to an archive by letting the installation scan a personal object they carry with them. This results in a two-dimensional map of digitized objects that is projected onto a large screen. The image archive becomes richer through the interaction with visitors, who rearrange objects and invest them with meaning.

The installation has two rooms. The entrance holds an information booth where visitors can scan a personal item to be included in the database, fill out a questionnaire and describe the item by a number of properties and keywords. On the basis of these linguistic characteristics, a 'self-organizing map' algorithm assigns the objects a position within the database structure. This self-organizing system, based on neural network structures, will position objects that overlap semantically next to each other on the map and also make sure their position is continuously updated.

In the exhibition space itself, the ordered images of the visitors' objects are projected onto a screen and the visitors can respond via web terminals, thereby initiating a 'conversation' between themselves, the on-line audience and the archive. Via a website all objects can be assigned new keywords, comments can be added, and positions and relationships can be changed. All of this additional information is added to the database, creating a rich mosaic of objects with a past. Not only does Pockets Full of Memories reflect the diversity of its audience, but, more importantly, it reveals how this diversity comes about.