Wonder and the digital double

The collaborative art practice of Brass Art is hybrid, performative and playful. This paper will focus on Brass Art's long-term engagement with 3D body scanning. It will examine how it has been used as a method of self-replication. It will discuss "the double" in relation to the uncanny and demonstrate how Brass Art have manipulated their personal 3D data to create alter egos, using expressive 3D modelling techniques, moving lights and 3D printing processes to create installations and pre-cinematic shadowplays. As Marina Warner observes,
"The theme [of the double] is intertwined with technologies of reproduction, first optical, then, increasingly biological. Representation itself acts as a form of doubling: representation exists in magical relation to the apprehensible world, it can exercise the power to make something come alive apparently."
Brass Art will present a series of installations that have been exhibited throughout the UK, including: Moments of Death and Revival (Yorkshire Sculpture Park and Hoxton Square, London), Rooted and Established (Croft Castle, UK) and Inside the Invisible (A Foundation, Liverpool). Brass Art will also discuss a new research project combining crafted digital 3D body scans with museum artefacts that have been duplicated using laser and CT scanning methods. Still Life (No.1) will be exhibited in Dark Matters, Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester, 2011.
The presentation will also discuss future research projects, and reflect upon collaborations with: UK Universities, Industry partners including Wicks and Wilson Ltd, outside agencies including Ogle Models and Prototypes Ltd and RapidformRCA, alongside other creative practitioners.