New Media: The Art of Sensory Codification in the Digital Age

“We use technology not for its essence, but because of its unavoidable and ubiquitous presence in our global world. It is no longer a tool or something separate from us; it is our second skin.” — Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980)

Media art first revealed its boundless potential during the Fluxus movement (circa 1960). Today, as the fusion of art and technology becomes increasingly mainstream, creators who integrate technology into their work continue to focus on stimulating and responding to the senses. With the growing portability of technological tools, artists are now able to concentrate more deeply on conceptual development—intensifying the encoding of sensory experience. This enables the visual to be heard, the auditory to be touched, and transforms the theoretical imaginings of Gilles Deleuze into tangible realities. Through the integration of technology and art, new media design leads audiences beyond linear experiences into multisensory streams of information, fundamentally reshaping perception and embodied experience.

This lecture features Hong Kong–based new media artist Keith Lam and Hung Yu-Tang, director of White Radiation Images. Drawing on numerous case studies, they examine how human sensory capabilities can be extended, amplified, and reactivated through media. The discussion also explores how technology, amidst the rise of new media, supports the capture of the abstract and interrogates the evolving relationship between human perception and media structures.