Origin of Somu: Digital Tools for Prototyping the Post-human Self
October 1, 2022
Presented by CultureHub LA
Origin of Somu is a chapter of an ongoing transmedia series that was created by CultureHub Resident Artist Andrea Kim. The Somu avatar's origin story is an allegory for entering the metaverse, raising questions about "masking" identities and performing new ones in this creator-forward take on agency in post-human times.
In a custom-built virtual space powered by Arium, Andrea read Origin of Somu in webXR and discussed how digital tools interface with creativity, techno-culture, and the human-machine relationship. This reading was also an auto-theoretical exploration of virtual identity, blending performance and speculative fiction in the way gender, culture, and technology are imagined and discussed.
Read the Origin of Somu Transcript and References.
Andrea Kim’s personal reflection on the project can be found here.