Amanda Turner Pohan received her BFA from The School of Visual Arts and an MFA from Hunter College. Pohan is currently working on The Linqox Criss Cycle, a five-part series of installations detailing the journey of Second Lifeavatar Linqox Criss as she slips between digital and physical embodiment. Each iteration manifests as scent, sculpture, sound, text, video and performance within a immersive environment. Through this project, Pohan asks, who is the avatar, where does her body begin and end, how does she thrive, what does she smell like. received her BFA from The School of Visual Arts and an MFA from Hunter College. Pohan is currently working on The Linqox Criss Cycle, a five-part series of installations detailing the journey of Second Lifeavatar Linqox Criss as she slips between digital and physical embodiment. Each iteration manifests as scent, sculpture, sound, text, video and performance within a immersive environment. Through this project, Pohan asks, who is the avatar, where does her body begin and end, how does she thrive, what does she smell like.
Notes about the work
Using an avatar from Second Life, Amanda created an immersive environment to explore concepts of identity and the making of the self.
On the screen, footage of the avatar Linqox Criss existing in Second Life and interacting with other avatars gives an idea how people are able to create imagined identities online.
Amanda Turner Pohan, Linqox Criss on Machines, Living and Otherwise, 2018Amanda made two ceiling panels covered with crushed computer screens and dust from her computer fan and a unique scent created from an algorithm of Linqox Criss’s HTML to be emitted into the room every 12 minutes. These two elements of the installation help to bring the online reality into the physical world. The dust collected from the computer builds up over time and as Linqox Criss continues to exist in Second Life. The scent is meant to evoke what it might be like walking through Second Life as you smell another avatar’s perfume or cologne.
In addition, the latex curtains help separate this artwork from the rest of the galleries, thus heightening its function as an encompassing environment.
The avatars continue to exist in the Second Life world, regardless of your participation. How might this affect the identities of the avatars? Will their identities remain static, or will they continue to change? (basically, do you think that the identities of the avatars are dependent on their creators?)
How do platforms such as Second Life and the use of avatars relate to how we express ourselves and define our identities? (considering that you can make your avatar look any way you want; it doesn’t have to look like you at all or even be the same gender).
