The smartphone, as a sleek and seductive object, places a premium on surface manipulation, while keeping its user in ignorance of its underlying mechanisms. Its ubiquity and portability have turned it into an extremity that allows us to surpass and amplify our mental capabilities, to overcome the laws of physics, specifically those of time and space, and to boost our sense of control. Without it and the virtual connected world it catapults us into, I and many others, feel handicapped.

When the digital world hijacks our ancient reflexes to lock our attention, how do we frame the digital world as 'manipulator' and not as 'mediator'?

How do we navigate and respond to the virtual world within our tangible reality?

What happens to time and space when we tap in and out of the virtual realm?

Through my series of experiments, I confront our interdependent relationship with the smartphone and break down the wider research into tighter concerns.