13. Implications and applications¶

The Archive of Emotion¶

Introduction: Burried Emotions¶

Human emotions are powerful yet intangible forces that shape our decisions, relationships, and identity. Often ambiguous and misunderstood, emotions affect us in ways we rarely notice. The Archive of Emotion seeks to make these unseen feelings visible by transforming them into wearable art. Using digital fabrication, fashion, and technology, this project creates a tangible map of our emotional landscape, offering a unique perspective on our inner world.

Inspiration: The Suffering And The Struggle of Understanding Emotions¶

This project is deeply personal, inspired by my struggles with understanding emotions and the journey toward self-awareness. I realized that self-awareness is essential for emotional maturity and navigating our inner worlds. The concept is to visualize how emotions fluctuate and accumulate over time by transforming them into wearable garments. These tangible representations of emotional complexity aim to help people embrace and better understand their feelings.

What¶

What?

This project creates a garment that captures a snapshot of our humanity.

By using physical cues—such as body temperature, EEG waves, or heart rate—it transforms intangible emotions into tangible clothing and textiles. Through documenting emotional fluctuations, the garment becomes a wearable representation of each person’s unique emotional journey. It is not just about patterns or data but about storytelling through design—creating a piece that embodies our inner world and invites reflection.

Group Activity: If Emotions Where Physical Entities What Would They Look Like?¶

I invited a group of talented individuals—my best friend Serene, Deema, Zayn, and myself—to explore emotions through abstract art. Each of us chose two to three emotions and created visual representations of how we perceive them. The results were strikingly diverse, showcasing the deeply personal and subjective nature of emotions.

Together, we created a kind of dictionary of emotions, capturing how each person sees and feels them without needing to make logical sense. The rough sketches became raw, unfiltered expressions, guided by the subconscious mind—a reminder that the greatest creations often arise from unspoken thoughts and feelings.

I went ahead and doodled these emotions myself—without order or intention. I let the process flow naturally, without overthinking, allowing my subconscious mind to take the lead. These unfiltered doodles became The Archive of Emotions. or a good start for it!

These doodles represent our days, our lives, how emotions interact with each other, and how they impact us without us even noticing. They became a raw and honest depiction of the emotional dynamics we experience daily, often buried beneath the surface.

The Goal¶

The goal of this project is to create a wearable art garment that weaves emotions into fabric, representing the emotional baggage we carry on our shoulders. Through textile storytelling, the textiles themselves become the storytellers, narrating the unique dynamics of each individual's emotional experiences.

Why¶

The Journey Emotional Maturity¶

Through this project, I aim to bring this process to life. By visualizing emotions through wearable art, I hope to inspire others to embark on their own journey toward emotional maturity. This project serves as a reminder that our emotions, while intangible, are powerful forces that can be understood, processed, and transformed into something meaningful.

Self Awareness

The first step toward emotional maturity is self-awareness. To truly understand and manage our emotions, we must first recognize them.

Self-awareness is about noticing what we feel, identifying our triggers, and observing our emotional patterns without judgment. It’s the foundation that allows us to acknowledge the presence of emotions and their influence on our actions and thoughts.

Self Reflection

The next step is self-reflection. Once we become aware of our emotions, we need to take time to process and reflect on them. This involves digging deeper to understand their origins, their impact on our decisions, and the way they shape our interactions.

Self-reflection helps us make sense of the complexities of our emotions, giving us the tools to learn from them and grow.

Emotional Maturity

Finally, we arrive at emotional maturity. This is the stage where we can navigate our emotions with clarity and compassion. Emotional maturity is embracing the emotions—allowing them to guide us without overwhelming us. It’s about turning our emotional struggles into strength and using them as a bridge to connect more deeply with ourselves and others.

Freud’s iceberg metaphor¶

While researching ways to visualize emotions, I stumbled upon a fascinating visualization of Freud's iceberg metaphor in an insightful study title Visualizing Emotions — For What? Freud’s metaphor uses an iceberg to represent the layers of the mind: the visible tip signifies our conscious mind, while the vast, hidden portion below the surface represents the subconscious and unconscious.

Applying this metaphor to emotions, the visible part of the iceberg "conscious Mind" symbolizes the felt emotions—those we can observe, name, and recognize in ourselves.

Just beneath the surface lies the borderline "The pre conscouis", representing emotions we can feel and recall through memory, even if they aren’t immediately present.

However, the largest and most powerful emotions lie deep within the subconscious mind, burried from our awareness. These are the emotions that subtly influence our decisions and behaviors, even though we may not realize they exist.

This metaphor beautifully illustrates the challenge of understanding emotions. To truly understand them, we must delve below the surface to uncover the hidden layers of our emotional selves. This concept inspired me to create a project that brings these intangible forces to light, giving form to what often lies unseen.

Inspiring Projects¶

While researching this project, I stumbled upon many amazing projects that visualized the intangible in extraordinary ways. One captivating example is Moving Shapes by Margrét Katrín Guttormsdóttir, where the fluidity and motion of dancing were beautifully captured and visualized.

Another awe-inspiring project is The Brain Wave Drawing Machine, which transformed EEG waves into physical movements that directed a pen to draw on paper. This innovative approach turned brain activity into an artistic form, showcasing how technology can bring abstract processes to life.

While researching this project, I discovered numerous incredible works that visualize the intangible. For example, Moving Shapes by Margrét Katrín Guttormsdóttir captures the essence of dancing by translating motion into a visual representation.

Similarly, the Synesketch project explores how technology and art intersect to create visual representations of abstract processes.

From the thoughtful exploration in the Visualizing Emotions — For What? article to the creative applications of EEG in art highlighted by EEG Art Exploration: Beyond The Canvas, these projects showcase innovative ways of bringing the unseen into a tangible form. Each of these works fuels my ambition to explore and visualize emotions in wearable, artistic forms.

How?¶

The approach for this project is still evolving, leaving room for exploration and experimentation. Initially, I started considering physiological indicators of emotions—such as pupil dilation, heart rate, brain waves, breath patterns, body temperature, and more—as the foundation for capturing emotional data.

The brain stands at the core of this exploration, as it is the primary source of our emotions. It triggers the chain reaction that leads to various physiological responses. These responses—manifesting as changes in our body—become tangible cues to the emotions we feel. For example, a racing heartbeat might signify excitement or fear, while steady breathing could indicate calmness.

The brain generates different types of brain waves—gamma, alpha, beta, theta, and delta—each associated with specific mental states and emotional experiences. These waves act as a form of visualization, offering raw data that reflects our emotional states.

By leveraging these indicators, the goal is to create a bridge between the intangible world of emotions and the physical world, translating these signals into patterns, shapes, and ultimately, wearable art. This layered approach aligns with the complexity of human emotions, treating the brain as the starting point and the body as its expressive canvas.

I tried to visualize The EEG waves as collection of clashing emotions

Workflow¶

The process begins with collecting data that reflects emotions through various physiological and experiential indicators. The workflow is as follows:

Identifying Emotional Cues:
Determine the types of cues to be captured:
- Physical indicators: Body temperature, heart rate, brain waves, etc.
- Experiential inputs: Conversations, reflective questions, interactions with books or art.

Data Collection:

Capture the chosen cues using:
- Physical sensors for physiological data.
- Journaling or observation for experiential inputs.

Data Translation:

Develop algorithms using Grasshopper for Rhino to:
- Transform the collected data into visual forms such as abstract patterns, lines, or densities.
- Represent emotional fluctuations accurately.

Visualization and Fabrication:

Convert visualized patterns into tangible designs.
Apply these designs to textiles through digital fabrication techniques:
- 3D Printing.
- Circular Fashion.
- Plisse and Pleating.
- Leather Molding.

💡 Comment: I would like to keep the possibilities open for the types of data used for translation as well as the fabrication techniques employed in this project. As I would like to research more in this matter and explore different inputs and outputs.

Who¶

For people seeking self-discovery, this project offers a reflective journey into emotional complexity. It also speaks to designers, artists, psychologists, and technologists intrigued by the intersection of art, technology, and human emotion. Additionally, it’s for curators and collaborators exploring innovative storytelling through wearable art.

When and Where¶

Possible Outcomes¶

Wearable Art Piece¶

Create an archive of emotions displayed on clothing, designed as textile and wearable art pieces that a person's reflect emotional baggage.

Exhibiton or An Experience¶

Develop an interactive gallery or exhibition experience that allows people to visualize and feel the impact of emotions and their interaction. One Impactful project like Melting Memories by Refik Anadol, which explores the intersection of art, technology, and memory.

Project's Proposal¶

Feedback and Reflections¶

Oscar:

"It is difficult to communicate emotions. I propose to try simple interactions on your body-based lo-fi prototypes. How can you physically express your emotions in a performative manner? How can these actions be enhanced?"

My Response: The first thing that came to mind is my anxiety. When I’m anxious, my body just radiates—I clench my teeth, breathe heavily, and bite my nails. When I see something majestic that I can’t explain, I get goosebumps! These physical reactions might be a starting point for exploration.

Anastasia:

"Maybe the data can inform the design, and the interaction can be more direct, easily communicated. I imagine only a stripe of lights at the very bottom of the garment pointing towards the ground."

My Response: This is a great idea for the performance aspect! The garment could represent the heaviness on our shoulders, and a light connected to the ground might symbolize how we’re tied to buried emotions in our subconscious. Another thought: making a heavy garment and a lighter one could beautifully represent the journey toward emotional maturity.

Cecilia:

"Hi Ola, I like the project concept. I also feel many people have a hard time communicating how they feel. What will be a challenge is identifying the separate emotions across different people. When I look at your board of lines/emotions, I feel different emotions. The spiral links to my anxiety, so I find this mismatch interesting. My suggestion is to explore if it’s entirely linked to you or fetched from many different people."

My Response: Yes! This was the whole point of the experiment—how each person has their own unique emotional archive. I plan to explore this further with people through stories and visual memories.

Claudia:

"Beautiful updates! Great narrative. Let's start prototyping simple and evaluate the progress. Book yourself and some people in the coming days for feedback sessions and interviews."

My Response: I’m planning to gather a group of people to listen to their stories. I want to understand how they feel, what they feel, and how their bodies reflect those emotions. This will guide my next steps.

Nuria:

Nuria shared a beautiful video of such an inspiring project by Elena Rotaru! The touch of sound Nuria shared a beautiful video of such an inspiring project by Elena Rotaru! The touch of sound

My Response: This project feels like the inverse of what I have in mind. Translating music into touch is amazing! Experiencing sensors differently—maybe like voice to visuals in my case—is an inspiring perspective.

Rico:

"Ola, I love the idea of taking 'emotional waves' as the starting point for pattern making. Since emotions are complex, I suggest you look into wave dynamics and wave physics. See how different waves multiply or cancel out other waves. Maybe these physical laws could help you expand the richness of your pattern making from emotional waves."

My Response: I watched the video you shared, and it’s mind-blowing! I love how it reflects the clashes, cancellations, and burying of emotions. I’m diving into Grasshopper tutorials and researching cymatic waves to incorporate this concept further.