Gallery Entry
Mis/Understanding
By Sara Pirahmadian · US
Mis/Understanding explores the human effort behind imperfect communication. Developed from my experience navigating English as a non-native speaker in the United States, the project began with a question: what happens between people when words alone are not enough? Rather than using technology to make communication seamless, the work deliberately creates conditions of uncertainty. Participants encounter incomplete language, unstable meaning, and moments in which understanding depends on movement, attention, interpretation, and the willingness to try again. Across the interactive installations, technology functions as a mediator rather than a solution. The systems respond to human speech and movement, but meaning is never produced by the system alone. It emerges through the participant’s decisions, interpretations, misunderstandings, and attempts to connect with another person. For me, this is where the work becomes particularly relevant as technological systems increasingly mediate how we communicate. Mis/Understanding asks what remains distinctly human within that process. Its answer is not perfect communication, but the effort to interpret, adapt, negotiate uncertainty, and construct meaning together. The work ultimately treats misunderstanding not simply as a failure of communication, but as a space in which human attention, empathy, and participation become visible.
- Category
- CONCEPTS MIXED MEDIA
- Approved
- 24 September 2026
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