Becoming a Human Computer Interface

A few days ago, while visiting the Maison d'Ailleurs in Yverdon-les-Bains Switzerland with my brother, I got the chance to become a joystick (literally).

The Maison d'Ailleurs is a museum of science fiction and fantasy that houses more than 70 000 works of science fiction and fantasy. The museum also houses temporary exhibitions.

The temporary exhibition currently at the museum is called: Playtime - Videogame Mythologies, an exhibiton devoted to the culture of video games...

One of the items in the exhibition is called Human to Human to Computer Interface. Here, two visitors get to play a very simple computer game where the players have to navigate the character to a door.

One of the player's control the character using two buttons and the other player controls the player.

Electrodes are attached to the arms of the player controlling the character (me). These are activated by the other player (my brother - who really enjoyed shocking me...). When activated, the current causes the hands of the character controlling player to twitch and press one of the two buttons causing the character on the screen to move left or right.

I have to admit, the current wasn't that strong enough to cause my hands to reach the button so I cheated towards the end but it still was an enjoyable and interesting experience.

The exhibition also includes the development of video games through history as well as concepts and prototypes for future games.

If your interested in video games (past and future) or electro-shocks, the video game exhibit is temporary. However, the collection of science fiction works is permanent and includes some rare and wonderful pieces worth seeing.

The Works of the Grand Engineer

In the film Prometheus; beings known as the "Engineers" are (believed to be) responsible for the creation of the Xenomorphs (the Alien creatures) and the human race on Earth. Although the film answers some of the questions about the Aliens, it also induces of tons of more questions into our minds. Such as: Where did the Engineers come from? and Is there a "Grand" Engineer responsible for the creation of the Engineers? and so on.

Today, I found the answer for the latter of the two, during a visit to the museum of the Swiss Surrealist artist H.R. Giger.

The art of H.R. Giger formed the basis of the famous Alien creatures and won him an Oscar award in 1980. Some of his earlier artworks and designs of the Alien creatures, a couple of sized replicas and his works for other films like Species can be found at his museum along with his Oscar award.

In the Aliens part of the museum, visitors can see some of his paintings, models and earlier designs of the Xenomorphs, the engineers, the Facehuggers, the space ships and much more. You can even come face to face with some Xenemorphs if you wonder away...

Visitors can also see some of H.R. Giger's works and designs he has worked on for the Species series (designs for Sil and Eve as well as a model of the Ghost Train which Sil sees in her nightmare...) and other films.

H.R. Giger designed and inspired the Engineers and the Xenomorphs which in a way makes him the Grand Engineer (at least until the sequel of Prometheus)...

Getting a chance to view his museum (again) at Gruyere Switzerland was a great honor for me (being a hardcore fan of science fiction). I advise everyone interested in the Alien franchise, science fiction or Surrealism to visit the museum. It will definitely be your time.

For those who are planning to visit, mind your head in the Alien exhibit. You never know what is hiding above you in the shadows...