Buddhism, Meditation and the Mind

Eva Lee applied to Art-A-Hack proposing to create an installation work visualizing electroencephalographic (EEG) brain data culled from neuroscientist Dr. Jose Raul Muradas’ research on prayers for self compared to prayers for others.

The data displayed numeric similarities and differences that occurred when subject participants meditated on self versus meditating on others. Different programming languages were investigated as a means to visualize data to represent aspects of human identity and consciousness.

During the process Ellen Pearlman worked with Eva as different programmers lent their expertise on various methods of representation. The results were process-oriented prototypes that included sonic and animated sketches.

Technical Challenges

In one presentation, the data translated brain frequencies into tones resulting in 100 short MP3s combined with spectrum visualizations. In another presentation the data sets were displayed as interacting particles built in Maya 3D.