Becoming Octopus is an 8 session guided meditation experience, whose aim is to transport the meditator into the body, perception and liquid environment of a Common Octopus. This involves prioritising the senses of touch and taste, processing reality with 8 arms and a central brain simultaniously; flowing the outside through the insides and camoflaging the body to become the ground using an array of colour effects and protean skin textures.
Each session has a theme in terms of octopus biology and sentience, and its relevance to aspects of our technology, culture and embodiment. Each session is between 10 and 12 minutes long and is a mixture of Blender 3D visuals, soundscape and Maggie’s calming voice guiding you.
Let go of your human eyes trained to focus front. Using perspectival geometry to locate you always at the centre of your awareness. Busy and precise in fixing things in relation to each other - in distance - with foreground. What is in focus is what matters.
MAGGIE ROBERTS
Filming in kelp forest waters off Capetown, South Africa (2019)
For me, the challange of imagining into the alien universe of a Common Octopus is a way of recalibrating my mind and senses to have a new awareness for everyone (human, non-human and synthetic) outside of my boundaried self.
Becoming Octopus was commissioned by IMT as part of THIS IS A NOT-ME, an online only exhibition made by a group of artists during the lockdown of 2020, curated by Mark Jackson.