At the current time of overload, hurry and scurry, rivalry and interpersonal alienation it seems that we are in want of genuine connection and attention. Human behavior is marked by the paradox of a profound split between introversion and the need to belong. Fear of the real world and intense dwelling in the virtual lead to obliviousness to real communications and ways of how to renew it, how to take part.
Hugging Sculpture is an interactive sculpture that is started off by a person hugging it and pressing it against their body, or even leaning on it. The device responds to pressure by returning the hug and starting to vibrate.
Hugging a device and not a person is part of virtual communication. But still, this unfeeling object does belong to material reality and can contribute to the opening and display of real feelings and thoughts instead of hiding them. It can help real communication and reduce self-enclosure and introversion. A harmless and innocent game with a sculpture thus opens up the way to making our feelings and needs conscious. The idea that Hugging Sculpture is designed as a product that could be put on somewhere in business premises and that employees could use it to balance their emotional needs is a partially comical and cynical commentary on today’s society.
production: KONTEJNER (DIY_ARTLAB)
Vitar Drinković (HR)
Vitar Drinković is a Croatian contemporary artist working in the fields of interactive installations, sculpture, extended reality (XR), computer game technologies, biofeedback, and new media technologies. His artistic practice explores perception, communication, and the relationship between the human body, technology, and virtual environments through participatory artworks. He graduated in Sculpture (2008) and Animation and New Media (2014) from the Academy of Fine Arts, University of Zagreb. He has presented more than twenty solo exhibitions and participated in numerous group exhibitions in Croatia and abroad, including at the Museum of Contemporary Art Zagreb, the Die Angewandte Festival in Vienna, the Pixxelpoint Festival in Slovenia, Schaumbad in Graz, Lauba – The House for People and Art, and Klovićevi Dvori Gallery, as well as exhibitions and festivals in France, Austria, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic, and the United States. He was a Radoslav Putar Award finalist (2021), participated in international artist residencies in France and the Czech Republic, and regularly leads workshops in the fields of interactive art and new media. As an external lecturer, he taught at RIT Croatia and participated in educational programmes at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb.
vitardrinkovic.com
