IM Blanky

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IM Blanky

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IM BLANKY is a blanket with an IP address. The basic v. 1.0 is self-modeling, which means that it is wirelessly linked to a digital model that registers and reprocesses its changing state in real time. The built-in capacity to situate and represent itself in space and time points to a most primitive and essential form of cognition — the sense of one’s own body. This proto-function constitutes a foundation for multiple additional functionalities that would be enabled with the use of other sensing devices in future generations of IM BLANKY. Soft tilt sensors arrayed in a hexagrid pattern and sewn into the fabric of the blanket enable the digital self-modeling. The data they generate—variation in current resistance—establishes the vectors from which the ‘topography’ of the entire field is extrapolated. This is achieved by computationally enmeshing sensor data in an “ecology” of topological relationships and extrapolating information from the behavior of the entire system: The data from each sensor determines the local tilt direction at the reading site; the readings from neighboring sensors establish elevation and orientation in 3D. The mapping of each vector against the entire field completes the overall picture. The electronic components and their circuits constitute figurative patterns. The organization of flows and connections here reproduces the logic of nature in generating intricate and hierarchical forms: stems, flowers and petals are the decorative by-product as much as the motivated form of a functional circuit. IM BLANKY was commissioned by an exhibition that invited artists and designers to project traditional embroidery and stitching practices into the 21st century. The project aligns ornamental craft with digital technology to invest the intelligence and knowledge built into traditional materials and forms with a renewed purpose and relevance in increasingly networked environments.

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Carol Moukheiber + Christos Marcopoulos

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IM Blanky

IM Blanky

Product Spec Sheet

Collaborating Firms

Team