Rob Collins
Immersion, Flow and Presence
Rob Collins is an artist, photographer and film maker who focuses on Lived Experiences. Rob’s work is an amalgam of still and moving image, performance, installation and sound. Not only does he explore human experience, but also how we live through and respond to those experiences.
In this latest work, Rob explores how we experience Immersion, Flow and Presence in real and virtual worlds.
Immersion can be experienced when we are enveloped by, included in, and interacting with an environment (Witmer and Singer 1998). Flow can be a holistic sensation we experience when we act with total involvement (Csikszentmihalyi 1975). It may be an all or nothing experience and responsible for positive emotions (Michailidis et al. 2018). Presence can be experienced when we feel we are in a place when we are physically in another place and acting with higher-level behaviour and autonomic responses (Slater and Wilbur 2006).
The work in this exhibition is a small selection of still and moving images captured during a long-term collaboration with staff at Nottingham Trent University. Part of the project involved using an Electroencephalogram (EEG) to record and evaluate the electrical impulses in the brain. Electrodes were attached to the scalp and cables were connected to transmit the brain’s electrical impulses for computer analysis. This can be used to detect patterns and potential problems in the electrical impulses in the brain.
Grateful thanks go to Tyrone and David who generously gave their time during the project.
