Dance of the Fulcrum 2.0 is a multisensory social installation, intended to promote interpersonal cooperation through incentivized movement and dance. The installation, designed for two primary users at a time, consists of a physical computing system that features spatial tracking and immersive visual, auditory, and haptic sensory feedback. From the tracking data between the two users, the system measures for proximity (to gauge social engagement), mirroring/symmetry of movement (to gauge attentiveness), and rate of change of movement (to gauge risk and play). Given these parameters, the system can then encourage and steer these behaviors by creating more interesting sensory feedback: enveloped, noticeable modulations to the multisensory elements. In this way, this installation serves as a friendship machine, rewarding pro-social behaviors.

The multisensory feedback encompasses visual and musical parameters—both auditory and haptic. Changes in interpersonal behavior impact changes in a virtual environment, projected behind each of the participants, within their respective lines of view. The behavioral parameters also impact music, including electronics with a voice and piano composition (“The Dance of the Fulcrum” by Alexis Story Crawshaw), with original lyrics in ancient Greek. Different elements of this musical work are routed to loudspeakers for auditory listening, and other elements are routed to a sonic haptic floor for somatic immersion. 

On the theoretical side, this project serves as an example of computational paideia, after the ancient Greek notion of education, which entailed cultural learning through the creation and experience of art. This project examines the capacity of cybernetic digital systems to cultivate learning and the development of values—specifically here, creative sociability—also exploring the application of theories related to mediated action, situated cognition (regarding embodiment, culture, and environment), and conceptual structure.