Khut’s works (Heart Library and Bright Hearts) invite visitors to explore connections between stress, relaxation, breathing and heart rate, using biofeedback controlled interactive sounds and visuals.

Visitors entering the Mood Lab lay down on a specially designed bed, and look up to see an image of themselves floating on the ceiling in a pool of brightly coloured lights. Wireless heart rate sensors record changes in heart rate influenced by stress and relaxation responses – these control the colour, texture and sound of the work: red for faster rates, changing to orange, yellow, green and blue for decreases in heart rate.

The experience is immersive, intimate and mesmerising, accompanied by a live soundtrack of your own heart beat, and sounds that rise and fall with changes in your breathing and heart rate. Afterwards visitors are invited to draw their own maps as a way of processing your experience.

Mobile Mood Lab Festival Schedule

Tuesday 31 Oct at UNSW Kensington 9am – 2pm, Fig Tree Lane, (Enter via Gate 4, off High Street)

Past Schedule

Wednesday 20 September, UNSW Art and Design Campus, Paddington: 6pm – 9pm

Thursday 21 September, Customs House: 10am – 4pm

Thursday 21 September, Fairfield Museum and Art Gallery: 6pm – 8pm

Friday 22 September, Customs House: 10am – 6pm

Saturday 23 September, Peacock Gallery Auburn: 1pm – 4pm

Sunday 24 September – Saturday 30 September, Customs House: 10am – 6pm

Thursday 28 September, UNSW Art & Design: 6pm-9pm

Tuesday 3 October, UNSW, Kensington Campus, Central Library Courtyard: 10am-1pm

Saturday 7 October, Fairfield City Museum and  Gallery: 10am-12:30 pm

Saturday 7 October, Peacock Gallery Auburn: 1.30pm – 4pm

Tuesday 10 October: Parliament House, Sydney: 10am-2pm

Thursday 12 , Friday 13, Saturday 14 October, Riverside Theatres, Parramatta: 12pm – 8pm

Thursday 19, Friday 20, Saturday 21 October, Riverside Theatres, Parramatta: 12pm – 8pm

Monday 23 October –Thursday 26 October, Mt Druitt (Closed event for local schools)

Festival Commission.

This project has been assisted by the Australian government through the Department of Communication and the Arts’ Catalyst—Australian Arts and Culture Fund.

George Khut

George Poonkhin Khut is an artist and interaction-designer working across the fields of electronic art, interaction design and arts-in-health. He lectures in art and interaction design at UNSW Art & Design. Khut’s body-focussed interactive and participatory artworks use bio-sensing technologies to re-frame experiences of embodiment, health and subjectivity. Research interests include tangible and embodied interaction, participatory art and Arts-in-Health.

In addition to presenting his works in galleries and museums, George has been developing new audiences for interactive and participatory art with exhibitions and research projects in hospitals, starting with ‘The Heart Library Project’ at St. Vincent’s Public Hospital in 2009, and more recently with the ‘BrightHearts’ research project – a collaboration with Dr Angie Morrow, Staff Specialist in Brain Injury at The Children’s Hospital at Westmead, Kids Rehab, that is evaluating the efficacy of his interactive artworks as tools for helping to reduce the pain and anxiety experienced by children during painful and anxiety-provoking procedures.