Momi

Use your head

Our culture insists that the brain is the sole locus of thinking, feeling, and caring, an isolated space where cognition takes place. My observations as a dancer have led me to understand that the body moves intelligently. Intelligence is bodily. Actions constrain or shape thought. Thought guides action. How can we make the body a knowledgeable decision-maker in the design process of objects, buildings, and cities? When I set out to find an answer to this question I learned that the problem starts early on and can be traced back to how we are instructed as children in schools, where we are taught to sit still, work quietly, and think hard—a model for the mental activity that will prevail during all the years that follow, through high school and college, and into the workplace. According to the NYC Department of Education, less than a quarter of children aged between 6-17 years participate in 60 minutes of physical activity every day.

Momi reimagines the classroom

Momi brings elements of light, sound, and shadow play onto existing classroom surfaces, providing spatial cues for children aged between 6 and 12 years to learn using their bodies. These interactive tools help teachers create embodied lesson plans and develop empathic collective experiences during or in between classes. Based on a participatory design approach, user interviews, workshops, and ethnographic studies informed a flexible design solution at the intersection of performance, and pedagogy. The interactive light uses stage-light technology and changes color in response to tapping sounds on its surface Children can use the multifunctional light as an instrument, for shadow play, or as a seat during an activity. The modular rug tiles provide a flexible tactile stage for children to perform and build empathy among peers, marking space in a classroom where they feel safe and vulnerable. The children can use the textural footprints and color blobs patterns to guide their movement and heighten the haptic response.

Use your body

Momi was developed in collaboration with teachers at P.S 270 Johann Dekalb School, Brooklyn, and is designed to promote social-emotional wellness and personal literacy in schools. Momi enables community participation in the broader system of education and child development, transforming learning environments where children employ their bodies, spaces, and relationships in the service of intelligent thought. Using new methodologies that place collaborative inquiry and performance studies at the core of the design process, this project proposes a tacit language of physical intelligence for dynamic city design through an interdisciplinary inquiry. Momi is the beginning of future explorations of body-based interactions in various contexts such as public spaces and among aging communities.