Out of this World: exploring embodiment and space through artistic processes and practice

Abstract

This article considers the artistic exploration of embodiment at the frontiers and edges of space. With a focus on both outer space and virtual space, the article explores the practices employed by artists who have taken on a virtual body as a vehicle to explore the virtual space of virtual worlds and those artists aiming to free their physical bodies of gravity and experience weightlessness in the artistic exploration of outer space. Perhaps the myths and realities of both astronauts (or those who have experienced their bodies in zero gravity) and avatars are one and the same – that of bodies travelling in unknown spaces and time. The article aims to reveal the common threads of experiences of embodiment and space drawing together issues of the weightless, the virtual and the immaterial body.