PNCTM

Idea

PNCTM is a multimedia interactive installation that reanimates historical diaslides using AI and generative tools, creating a reflective dialogue about the impermanence and malleability of memory. The installation features three frame boxes with integrated screens displaying dynamic animations beneath historical slides, enhanced by interactive magnifying lenses and an immersive ambient soundtrack.

A Photo Box photo: Hsun Hsiang Hsu

The medium of collectible, archival, and simply discarded transparencies is disconnected from its original contexts. PNCTM reanimates these fragments by engaging AI and generative tools to expand, distort, reimagine, and highlight the static images. This process mirrors the fluidity and transience of memory as it fades, transforms, and distorts over time. The intermedial dialogue embodies the idea of the plurality of perception.

Inspired by Roland Barthes’ notion of the ‘punctum’ in ‘Camera Lucida,’ the installation seeks to evoke the unexpected, poignant moment of personal resonance within each viewer. Drawing on David Le Breton’s perspectives on perception and Susan Sontag’s critical exploration of photography and memory, the installation challenges viewers to consider how memories are constructed and reconstructed—shaped by individual subjective lenses and the collective memory of society.

Video documentation

Context

The original collection of diaslides began with a box of old slides found on the streets of Bremen. This discovery sparked an interest in the psychological and neurobiological mechanics of memory, leading to the creation of the artwork “Forgetting Machine”. Building on this foundation, the author focused on several important aspects for PNCTM:

Importance of Memory Medium and Representation: Unlike digital memory archives, old diaslides have physical mass and presence. A collection of 400 glass diaslides from Bremen in the 1950s-60s weighs over 3 kilograms, but the collection’s significance is easily transported and transformed through digital platforms like eBay. This physicality demands a means of exceeding the flatness of a projection screen, providing a deeply personal experience.
Perception of Photography through Anthropological and Personal Lenses: The search for a deeply personal response guided the selection and curation of the diaslides for the artwork, alongside their technical compatibility.
Agency of AI as a Metaphorical Perceiver: By using AI to interpret and transform the images, the artwork universalizes the experience, bridging human and machine perspectives without claiming authorship or ownership over the images.

Photos: Slava Romanov

Technical side

The artwork utilizes:

Set of curated old diaslides (Bremen, 1958; DDR, 1960s), author unknown, laid over high-definition digital screens.
Stable Diffusion web-UI by Automatic1111 web API for generating imagery based on a source image and a caption.
MusicGen accessed through DotSimulate’s TouchDesigner module for generating the soundtrack.
Customized photo boxes with MDF-made photo frame, 5-inch FHD photo preview screen, integrated Android TV box, active air cooling in custom 3d-printed casing
Derivative TouchDesigner as an integration hub for generating and mapping the visual output and hosting a generative algorithm.
MIDI Controller as a realtime performance and recording control operating generative algorithms

Presentation

Initially showcased at Studies of Change (Alte Pathologie Bremen, May 29 - June 2, 2024), PNCTM invites viewers to engage deeply with historical images, evoking personal memories and emotions. The installation was realized under the guidance of Prof. Ralf Baecker, Hochschule für Künste Bremen, as part of the course perception\experience.

Bibliography

Barthes, R. (1981). Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography. Translated by Richard Howard. Hill and Wang.
Le Breton, D. (2006). La Saveur du Monde: Une Anthropologie des Sens. Éditions Métailié.
Sontag, S. (1977). On Photography. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Authors

Slava Romanov: Concept, design, and execution