Creative Technology in Art: Jose Macasinag on Bridging Humanity and the Natural World

Public art, at its best, inspires us to consider our surroundings and our role in caring for them. Calgary-based media artist Jose Macasinag brings this to life with immersive, digitally crafted installations and experiences.

During his 2023 Public Art Residency, Jose developed Flutter: a projection-mapped installation that depicted butterflies rippling in the Sunalta Community Association garden in Calgary, alongside insects and humans, revealing a delicate balance of this connection. In his practice, Macasinag is calling upon biological influence and a deep sense of listening to encourage reflection on human behaviour on our delicate ecosystems. Working in various disciplines that originate from new media technologies, Jose explores how we can connect with the natural world and remain mindful of its changes and needs in the Anthropocene.

Speaking with Dean Vukovic (STEPS Cultural Content Writer), Jose Macasinag shared insights on his creative process, fostering social awareness through interactive digital art, embracing slowness, and strengthening community in the arts at a crucial time.

“Flutter” was displayed at the Sunalta Community Association garden, accompanying a musician’s performance. Image credit: Lavounie Doan.

This feature is part of Fieldnotes, a public art blog series by STEPS that promotes inclusive and innovative public art through interviews, storytelling, case studies, and knowledge sharing.

Artist Interview with Jose Macasinag

Dean Vukovic (DV): We’re very familiar with you and your work here at STEPS. I was wondering if you could speak about your time at the CreateSpace Residency and participation in the Public Art Forum?

Jose Macasinag (JM): When I started the Residency, I was in the middle of my university studies. I still am in a part-time way, but having that firsthand experience with the Residency and trying to set up my installation opened up things, and connected me to many community members and organizers here in the city. 

I’m always looking for new ways to learn. Because it was my first time making a public art piece, I didn’t know how to set my time, how to schedule things, or how to pace it out yet. That was pretty exciting, because it was my first foray into this. Most of my experience has been as a media or digital artist, and a lot of times, I’m reclusive. And then, after having the conversations with the community, I was like: “Okay. I can do this.” 

It’s one of those things that, unless you actually try to do it or put yourself into that position, you won’t know what’s going to happen. You don’t know what’s going to work out. I think a lot of artists can become very analytical and plan things. You want everything to go a specific way. But once it’s out there, you’ve got to let your baby go and then see whatever sticks, and be open to what people think about it. That’s one of the hardest things that I had to learn.

I was using projection mapping as I was programming the animations. And typically for me at the time, it was confined to controlled spaces. White wall spaces that I have control over, to electronics where I could control where things are, such as sensors. But now I’m bringing it outside, out into the elements, and it requires a whole bunch of different things. 

There is definitely a long history of projection mapping. A lot of folks have been using it since the 70s, displaying a lot of text-based pieces in New York, like Jenny Holzer’s conceptual works. I was inspired by that, bringing the screen-based practice and having it merge with what’s already outside. That’s what happened with Flutter, because I thought: “How do I give thanks to the bugs that give us vegetables every year?” So, I illuminated these butterflies and beetles. I liked the idea of it being in the space in the greenery. Flutter was in a vegetable garden too, which was perfect.

“Passages” (2023), an interactive projected video installation inspired by the Hoodoo’s in Drumheller, Alberta. The piece visualizes human effect on prairie landscapes, moving through altered or still states depending on audience movement. Courtesy of the artist.

DV: I love the piece, as someone with a technical love for projection mapping, but also an appreciation for how the digital element of the piece showcases the insects. As a new media artist myself, there is sometimes a tendency to be reclusive.

I find that when new media artists get together, it’s usually after we’ve each been working alone for some time, and then we’re brought into a collective moment. Sometimes I wonder if that has to do with the technology and the medium itself. Digital art offers so much space for play, but it can also be manipulated with precise control, down to individual parameters. I’m curious whether that balance finds its way into your practice.

JM: It depends on how I implement the installation or what I’m thinking of. Usually, there’s an idea and how I want to present it when it comes to mapping. When it comes to a digital mural that you’re extending over into other places, I’m thinking of ways to present the idea. For me, it’s really about showing gratitude for the things that I’m making. A lot of times, I animate animals and biological. Sometimes abstraction and proceduralism give rise to patterns, like how they can mimic cellular life. I’m trying to show that we’re part of something that’s bigger, and I want to keep supporting that fact. 

Right now, I feel the need to critique the very tool that I’m using, along with the concerns they raise – environmental or otherwise. On the occasion that I do use something more interactive, like pressing a button or being seen by a sensor or a camera, I want that aspect of digital to show them that they are part of something. However, your presence in those spaces is affecting things that are very deep in the natural environment. 

That added layer of tactility and interactiveness also means that sometimes I don’t always get the effect you anticipate or hope for. You’re never going to get a specific thing that you want from your audience or whoever in public, because it’s not something that you can predict. But on rare occasions, you can notice that it sparks something within people.

There’s a lot of cynicism in conversations, specifically in environmentalism or just politics, and it’s hard to get out of that. In those instances where you can disrupt that and make people feel that they can do something about it, it is important. Maybe the button or the sensor helps them feel like they’re connected on some level. We’re often detached from our environment since, within our communities, we depend on external devices to sustain awareness.

DV: What I’ve appreciated about your work is the way that the audience is called in and personally addressed in a moment, to reflect that they’re part of something bigger. We are part of thousands and millions of ongoing processes, biologically, environmentally, many of which are known to us, but we ignore. That relationship between yourself and the audience, is there anything there that you’re still looking to articulate in your practice?

JM: The past couple of years, I’ve been mostly using mapping the most often and doing a lot of festivals too. Right now, I typically spend half my time just being in the woods. And I know that’s totally odd, because it’s like, “Why are you showing your work outside, and why are you projecting in the woods when no one sees it?” But something I learned through readings and philosophies is that it’s not just about the people who see your work. I know there are other humans, but there are plants [too]. I don’t know if they’re seeing it, if they care about it, but it’s important for me to have that connection. And this is how I verbalize that idea. I want to extend the impact. 

I’d like for people to continue participating in my pieces, as opposed to seeing it as purely storytelling. I’m also considering consent – for a lot of media artists, when we’re making interactive art, consent gets thrown away. When you make those things, and you put them in random spaces, or you make things pop out, you expect people to automatically think: “What’s this?” You expect to engage their curiosity and give them this “WOW moment once they press the thing. 

I once had an experience where the subject of my work involved a person who hadn’t really consented to it. They were simply going about their daily life when they encountered an animation that touched on something deeply personal to them. All they wanted at that moment was to get home. It’s tricky—you have a responsibility to present ideas and bring them into the world, but it’s difficult because you can’t control how people will receive them.

Because of the work that I do, sometimes it’s a spectacle of rapid animations, and you can’t just throw it out to exist in random spaces at night or urban spaces that people can negatively react to.

DV: Could you share how you are finding the experience of beginning your practice in one area, and the desire to explore new aspects of your practice, such as different mediums?

JM: Because of my background and the things that I’m comfortable with, I definitely start off in the digital realm. The medium gives me the ability to think and plan further ahead. It’s a more sustainable approach; instead of constantly producing work every two weeks, I can develop projects over the long term. I’m also moving towards more sculptural work, and surprisingly, I’m exploring a fibre practice. I’ve been making inflatables, and for some reason, a lot of the people in the media arts community here in Calgary have a side fibre practice. I mean, we wouldn’t have gotten computers without the loom.

That tactility, practicing slowness, and all the time that I spend sewing my inflatable sculptures, gives me time to be introspective about things. With digital, everything goes fast. I think it’s very important to slow that. Right now, because of the things that I’m concerned about, it’s mentally taxing, and I need to slow down. I wanted to make things that are soft. I needed to give something to myself, which is a place of care. And right now, I’m making giant inflatable people that I leave on the grass somewhere.

Recent exploration of inflatables laid down in public natural spaces. Courtesy of the artist.

These figures look like giant babies that are just sleeping on the grass or a bed of dandelions. I have them running on these minimal three-volt fans, and sometimes I attach them to a solar panel. They just run for thirty minutes when the sun is out, but then once the sun is gone or the clouds come in, they sleep. 

I think there’s something about the tactility in the physical form that you see when you go out randomly in the woods, and then you see these works. And at the same time, it can be complementary to what I’m doing with mapping. Mapping happens a lot at night, but the physical works give me an opportunity to actually put things out during the day and be present with other people. Whenever I make these sculptures, I always tell people, “You can hug them. Yeah, you can sleep on them.” After doing digital for some time, I needed to be able to touch and embrace things that are soft.

DV: It brings you out of the brain and into the body, or into the self in a different way. That brings me to my next question, because you mentioned how the community in Calgary is moving into a certain arts practice. 

I want to speak about building community for a moment, because artists have always had to depend on each other. We’re going to need to do so more than ever, in our cultural and environmental moment. It seems like we’re all really aching for more community, but there’s also a sense of reclusivity or a notion of self-reliance. How do you imagine that digital or media arts communities can foster relationship building so that we are supported, more refreshed, and preparing each other for longevity?

JM: When it comes to media artists and new media, there’s generally no rule on how the art is going to be. I think the best advice I can give is to be intersectional and always have room for other things to grow, especially when it comes to community. Don’t compartmentalize yourself into your specific niche groups; if you think of everything as a whole: musicians, dancers, everyone who’s involved in the process. There are ways to bring that into your practice. I work with a lot of musicians, and some of what I create ends up supporting their act as stage lighting. When I work with musicians or performance artists, our work complements each other in the space. 

You really have to show up. There are many ways to support groups, but when you spread your roots, you carry something unique into new spaces—and that’s where conversations begin. Even if only two people come out, that’s still community. Right now, a lot of us are in survival mode—especially those in nonprofits, where we’re all holding onto the same resources. That’s why having these connections matters so much, because they let us share and support each other.

Because of STEPS and the funding from the residency it allowed me to purchase a generator and a projector. So now, I lend that out to projection mappers here and sometimes muralists too. It’s a shared resource, right? Share information, share your techniques, share code. Try to use models that are open source. Things that are available online are for people to learn and have more continuity while accessing the resource because it’s free. 

These technologies seem to carry an intent: to be small, mighty, and open. They’re about putting people first—making it easier to share information or simply to build community. For me, that means keeping things minimal but impactful. When I’m planning installations, I ask myself: if someone on the other side of the world couldn’t easily recreate this, maybe it’s more complex than it needs to be. I don’t want to be part of that creative economy that pulls more resources out of you than it gives back.

“That Happened?” (2024), at the centre of a space among interactions and conversations between participants. Courtesy of the artist.

DV: In your previous works, pieces that are environmentally critical and deeply tied to our current moment, you’ve incorporated play. Participants experience your work through play and interaction, whereas some might assume these subjects leave little room for playfulness. Could you speak to how play and interactivity influence critical engagement in your work, and how they might open space for imagining better futures?

JM: I think play is very important. We are people first; everyone is a child at heart. People who write about this subject note that implementing play in your piece lowers people’s guard for your message. Most of my art exists in festivals. I’m rarely in institutional media art spaces or white wall galleries. When it comes to spaces like that, there are certain expectations on how to perceive art. When you add play, you disrupt people’s expectations of the art piece. You’re also adding a layer of care because you care about the person, and you’re welcoming them in. When your idea is huge and important, one of the best ways to have it simmer down is by encouraging participation. 

Play allows for that space. I don’t want people to fall into cynicism. Humour and play are important to disrupt that. As an artist, you want your work to be seen by everyone, not just people who just support the practice, and the added aspect fosters that. It allows the work to reach a deeper point in your body. It floods you with hope that inspires social change.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

About the Artist

About the Writer

Dean Vukovic (he/him) is a visual artist, emerging writer + curator and arts administrator finishing a Bachelor of Fine Arts in New Media at Toronto Metropolitan University. His research interests (and internet rabbit holes) intersect across media arts practices, digital culture, community engagement, collaborative art-making and cultural heritage. Dean is the Cultural Content Writer at STEPS for the summer and fall of 2025.

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