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Learning @ The Crossing

Preeti Mehra

`` People continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free and where people are continually learning to learn together.''

These lines by Peter Senge could very well have been written for the research team working at New Delhi's Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) office. Together they are creating what they call

`` A living document'', which is basically an innovative experiment in multimedia presentation.

To explore this unique interactive experience in learning, where the body becomes an extension of technology and instruction goes beyond the desk top and the mouse, Xerox PARC has chosen the ancient city of Benaras. Christened `The Crossing: Learning and Transformation in Benaras,' it is an interesting experiment in how art, culture and technology can converge on one interactive platform.

Though the project is yet to be completed, a preview of its potential in New Delhi recently showcased the innovative shifts in the documentation presentation paradigm from a usual, screen-based presentation to different 3D, digital formats. There were no t one or two, but a number of technology-driven tools that made the history, geography, culture and ambience of Benaras come alive for the viewer. The interface gadgets consisted of wireless, mobile computing boxes and screen, a physical browser, a weara ble computing garment and a music wheel.

Each one of them, when held in the hand or touched, unfolded a world of learning -- the temples of Benaras, it's ghats, rivers, priests, cremation points, weaving traditions, music and mythology in the most interactive manner. `` As the birth place of ma jor world religions and rich cultural heritage of classical and folk art forms, India serves as the best experimental lab to bring hi-tech digital documentation and traditional art together for building the future technology of learning,'' explains Ranji t Makkuni, a leading research scholar at Xerox PARC who has specially set up a media lab in New Delhi to develop this project.

For the experiment Makkuni's team is also hundred per cent Indian. It includes Robotics/Embedded systems experts from the Indian Institute of Technology, designers from the National Institute of Information Technology and creative professionals from the National School of Design. Assisting them in the project is a network of museums including the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, New Delhi, National Gallery of Modern Art, Mumbai and the Asia Society, New York.

What was it like experiencing the team's high-touch interfaces? At first very confusing, for you wondered how the gadget functioned and would it really be effective in conveying what it's trying to. But in hindsight, the experience was memorable, with a high recall potential. That is what obviously makes the interfaces effective tools of learning and bring alive a subject.

Take for instance the hand held, box-like device painted with an aspect of Benaras culture. To get behind the painting and learn about the historical symbolism of each tree, plant, temple etc. all you have to do is gently press the defined icon spaces. L o and behold! you have the entire mythology and history of the icon.

Next is a computing garment embroidered in intricate zardosi and worn by a mannequin. Within the floral design are hidden press buttons which, when touched, set off a historical journey on an accompanying digital screen. The interactive device not only t eaches, it fascinates.

The `magic eye' device also makes for exciting, interactive instruction. A large canvas painted with the temples, ghats and mythology of Benaras serves as the teaching backdrop. A movable computing eye can be shifted on it, up and down, side to side and reveals the historical background to each icon. For instance at a temple, the computing eye will turn into a video screen and provide you a commentary along with someone actually performing the classical dance of that particular period.

Then there is an ordinary-looking spoked wheel, which when touched makes the music of a bygone era. Side by side lies a flat digital screen that seems to extend from outwards from one's body and provides the ambience of the subject. In this case, one exp erienced an aspect of Benaras and `the crossing.'

The Crossing Project, however, will only be complete by September this year and this physical/virtual multimedia exhibit is slated to be showcased in India, Paris and New York.

However, this is not Xerox PARC's first initiative in India. In 1997 Makkuni was acclaimed for his multimedia effort at the IGNCA, New Delhi. Known as the Gita-Govinda project, it was a collaborated effort with well known scholars, artists and designers to develop a multimedia exhibit based on an 12th century lyrical Sanskrit poem Gita-Govinda. the project won an Interactive Media Award from the ID Magazine, New York.

Makkuni's second project that made waves was an Electronic Sketchbook of Thangka Paintings, which served as an interactive exhibit at the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco. ``The museum visitors used the electronic sketchbook to penetrate the `outer' form of Tibetan paintings to access the world of the `inner' process,'' reveals Xerox PARC.

The current project is no less ambitious. It promises to change the face of museums and learning technology in the world.

And Benaras may be it's via media -- the crossing.

Picture: Ranjith Makkuni, a research scholar at Xerox PARC, New Delhi.