The Labyrinth Project
EXPANDING THE LANGUAGE OF INTERACTIVE NARRATIVE
"A labyrinth is a multicursal maze representing alternate paths to the source of being."
Team: Marsha Kinder, Rosemary Cornella, Kristy H.A. Kang and Scott Mahoy
The Labyrinth Project is a research initiative on interactive narrative at the University of Southern California. Under the direction of cultural theorist Marsha Kinder since 1997, Labyrinth has been working at the pressure point between theory and practice. With digital media artists Rosemary Comella, Kristy H.A. Kang and Scott Mahoy, Kinder has been producing award-winning database documentaries that juxtapose fictional and historical narratives in provocative ways. In the process they have invented a new form of digital scholarship that combines cultural history and artistic practice. They design their works as interactive transmedia networks--installations, DVD-ROMs, and websites--that grow out of productive collaborations with artists, scholars, scientists, students, archivists, museums and other cultural institutions.
Koreatown: Characterizing the Global City of Los Angeles
This digital city symphony explores “Koreatown” both as a physical place in midtown Los Angeles and the Korean-American community after whom this neighborhood is named. It examines L.A.’s “Koreatown” through an excavation of its layered cultural and ethnographic history and explores the evolution of the relationship between Koreatown and Korea.
A Tale of Two Genes: Exploring the Biology & Culture of Aggression & Anxiety
An interactive trans-media project focusing on Dr. Jean Chen Shih’s thirty years of pioneering molecular research on a crucial pair of brain enzymes, known as the MAO A and MAO B genes (monoamine oxidase) that help control aggression and anxiety in mice and men.
Three Winters in the Sun: Einstein in California
An interactive installation and DVD-ROM presenting a multi-perspective portrait of Albert Einstein.
The Dawn at My Back: Memoir of a Black Texas Upbringing
An interactive DVD-ROM based on a memoir written by Carroll Parrott Blue exploring the urban landscape of Houston, Texas through personal history and memory.
Tracing the Decay of Fiction: Encounters with a Film by Pat O’Neill
Based on Pat O’Neill’s film The Decay of Fiction (2002), this interactive project is an archeological exploration of the Hotel Ambassador, a once grand hotel now in ruins. Visitors encounter the layers of cultural histories and personal dramas that occurred there.
The Danube Exodus: The Rippling Currents of the River
An immersive installation about the displacement of ethnic minorities and the possible connections between them. Based on an award-winning film by Hungarian filmmaker Péter Forgács, this piece premiered at the Getty Center in 2002.
Mysteries & Desire: Searching the Worlds of John Rechy
An interactive memoir that presents an array of personal materials by and about the writer John Rechy and sets them against the larger collective histories of Chicano culture and the gay world.
Jewels & Scars: Anjaane Geheno Ki Baath (The Language of Unknown Jewels)
An interactive installation made in collaboration with Nithila Peter that involves a cyclical exploration of four myths taken from Indian and Western culture. These myths are transformed into a metaphorical map of the artists’ identities.
Collective Memory
An interactive installation and CD-ROM that combines animation and poetry to explore a landscape of personal memory mapped onto the female body.
