gestures (soa) — Georg Eckmayr

gestures
(songs of
algorithm)

>> Variable and modular work for mobile devices, networks, timelines, LED walls and paper

“We touch data.“

In this project I explore our evolving tactile relationship with machines, turning mobile devices into instruments that form a choir. I let machines “tap back” through a networked, decentralized audiovisual sculpture. With this work I consider how our intimate interactions with data – perhaps even more than with people – might shape new, tactile societies beyond speech and institutions.

→ Networked sculpture, 13 audio-visuals bundled via one smart contract, html code, scanographies, animation, paper wallet, blockchain / 2026.

→ Various digitally signed animations / 2025-2026
→ Various prints on paper / 2025
→ LED wall version / 2026

→ Research paper published by Wroclaw University Press

○ Thanks to Arndt Niebisch for coding support.
○ Find an interview discussing my approach here.

"I am particularly interested in transferring the work from the white cube into the audience’s private space. There is a significant difference between encountering a work on a gallery wall and experiencing it on one’s own personal phone; the mode of perception becomes more intimate, subjective, and embodied.”

Work description

At the center of the project is a networked sculpture, stored fully decentralized and accessed through a simple paper wallet. The sculpture unfolds into 13 audiovisual pieces, each activated by scanning a QR code with a mobile phone. When performed together, these individual works merge into a single, mechanistic choir — a distributed instrument played by many devices at once. The surrounding works grow from the same shared material and ideas.

The works are designed to operate across multiple media, in accordance with Ippolito and Rinehart’s Variable Media paradigm. Beneath the choir for thirteen used mobile devices (networked, code-based sculpture), the project includes works ranging from ink on paper to digitally signed animations or LED Walls.

My work is largely independent of specific devices and operates on the slimmest possible infrastructure. It is intentionally designed for variability across media, allowing it to move beyond conventional white-cube settings and establish a dialogue between the gallery space and the audience’s personal mobile environments.

Background

A large part of our social interactions now happens through handheld devices and their screens. These tools are not just part of our daily routines — they become intimate objects, shaping the way we move, act, and relate. As our gestures and connections increasingly pass through screens, it’s not only our social behavior that changes — society itself is being reshaped. We no longer touch people directly; we touch data.

This raises a provocative question: what kind of society can emerge from this shift? Perhaps a tactile society — one that exists in digital realms, beyond speech, beyond institutions, and beyond traditional forms of human connection.

Networked Sculpture: