The Attempt to Overcome Gravity: i_am TORQUE

→ mp4, audio, (full hi-res files available) → mobile devices, behavioural data, reconstructive modelling, scanographies, animation / 2026

Identification with the unseen, I am sensor data to serve the data-driven optimisation of my physical existence – I’m turning myself into data to reconstruct my own body from a machine’s perspective. What does the machine ‘see’ when it claims I’ve burned 300 kcal, ran 500 meters or had a pulse that is too high? What model of the body does it use to predict, qualify and judge? I systematically collected this astonishingly abstract and glitched sensor data, mapped it to scans of my body, and used it to create the animations for these pieces.  Through mobile tracking surveillance, our bodies and behaviours are deeply entangled with and shaped by algorithmic standardisation and optimisation. Data swarms around us like a second skin; our physical existence is non-consciously embedded within it. I aim to make this second skin tangible – a physical instance. What does it feel like to be embedded in data? The tracking data exists across various levels of abstraction and is divided into different categories and degrees of detail, reduction or noise. Glitches regularly occur and mostly the machine does not exactly know what I am doing. My method involves projecting these abstract layers of data back onto the physical body – using the gathered information to create a consistent yet fragmented model of my body and its behaviour. The audio compositions use data streams and sensor-noises made audible and notifications sounds gamifying my training behaviour. Ubiquitous media – our second skin of data – blurs the line between our private domain and that which is public and accessible. It externalizes the intimacy of our bodily existence, revealing truths we would never openly disclose – often without us even knowing.