Lili Eva Bartha is a fashion designer and a mathematician. You might think this unusual combination could not work very well but instead, this academic career led her to create a very unique and original view and style.
Lili Eva Bartha’s research covers digital collections and fashion platforms, the use of technologies in the art field, and the concepts of diversity and inclusivity. Her answers surely make an interesting statement and stimulate our imagination. Definitely a must-read!
Tell me about you and your education.
My unique perspective on the creative sector derives from a background that combines a scientific mindset with an innovative design thinking, as besides having a BA and MA in Fashion, I am also a trained Mathematician.
Studying the building blocks of the universe, my mathematical background let me to question definitive systems, norms and traditions. I especially found interest in visualizing solutions and algorithmic models, which later on manifested itself in my fashion career as my two strengths: systematic thinking and very strong visual communication.
However, the increasing understanding of how negative the socio-environmental footprint of fashion is, pushed further my thinking and motivated me to explore how I can assist in improving the system with this unique combination of skills I developed.
This helped me to evolve into a designer and researcher, looking at fashion and embodiment from an experimental perspective, with an innovative thinking.
What do you think of today’s use of technology in the arts?
Digital tools and cross-realm thinking can lead to new perspectives on creative processes. I believe that the possibilities are endless, especially where definitions, such as reality or fiction, expand, blur, and lead the way to new horizons of design.
Creatives with such combined tool-kit a skill-set, can access a really strong and unique medium, with the power of multi-sensory narratives and immersive design approach, where creation becomes the experience itself.
Do you think digital collections are the future of fashion? Aren’t they missing a certain element of materiality?
As you can see from recent fashion reports, the adoption of digital fashion tools has extremely sped up in the last months.
The emerging technologies are not new, they have been slowly increasing in importance, but due to critical circumstances such as COVID-19, deeply disrupted retail, logistics, supply chain activities, and the traditional calendar of fashion needs new solutions, faster than ever.
Customers are facing altered purchase behavior, and are opening up more and more to digital products, filters and AR applications, or a superimposed digital garment on their latest Social Media post.
But would this be the future of fashion? I doubt so. This is a way, and there are many. I think it is important to remember the tactility, the materiality, the sensorial value of physical experiences. Digital fashion can deliver new experiences, and can improve critical issues, but it also has to deliver the multi-sensory experience we perceive as ‘fashion’.
Currently there is a lot of research work being done in haptics, and how to bring tactility into digital experiences.
I believe that in the near future, the technological developments will speed up, and we will be able to see a new form of digital fashion, with unseen immersive solutions.
How can we actually identify fully in an avatar? How do you imagine yours?
I would say, identification is not the right word. It could be immersion, immersing yourself in a new way of self-expression, on human presence in the digital. Custom avatars, skins for gaming, digital influencers and models, all new forms of existence and experience.
I am especially interested in experimental embodiment, virtual transformation, and I created a VR world where you can ‘try on’ anybody you want. I have been a pink plastic body, clouds, abstract entities, anything that you can imagine. There are no limitations, and I love the freedom.
Vital questions around diversity and inclusivity, gender and race have to be discussed when promoting freedom and equality within cross-realm existence.
Tell me about the “parametric garden”.
Parametric garden is a new work on the conformational change of SARS-CoV-2 S Trimer.
Using the spike protein PDB structures, the scientific data is used to display the point cloud, showing the position of atoms, which then are processed further to be visualized in a number of ways.
The project aims at creating an interactive and immersive VR experience (Unity3D) to raise awareness about the attributes of the virus.
Next steps will be to develop interactive options where the user can directly alter the temperature parameter which can cause procedural noise animation, connecting the user’s real-time input to real-time reactions from the modeled proteins.
Are there any future projects you would like to tell us about?
Currently we are preparing the digital launch of our immersive accelerator program.
Digital DK is a digital incubation programme for Danish independent designers and SMEs with a sustainable focus, initiated by the DFF team in the spring of 2020. Selected labels have been invited to the opportunity to get a number of their current styles digitalized with custom avatars, in order to showcase it on an online platform / or create a digital experience for the brand.
The action plan promotes SMEs holding sustainable values at their core, and helps in the adoption of digital tools into the Danish Fashion Industry. The solution does not only act as an alternative due to cancelations on physical showcase options because of the global pandemic, but provides an opportunity to be the first hybrid digital ‘fashion event’ platform in Denmark.
While using pioneer digital tools to recreate styles digitally, a digital showcase space will be engineered as well, where styles can be viewed via 360° digital spaces through screens, augmented and virtual reality.
Stay tuned for the launch on www.horizons.directory.
