Spanish interaction designer Roger Ibars will work on his “hard-wired devices”-project. He will attach (hard-wire) 100 different joysticks to timers to control its functions. By creating 100 different devices he intends to rescue vintage joysticks from the past and give them a new meaning, a new use and a new life. Each piece will be documented with detailed information about the features of each device and history facts of the joysticks.

Hard-wired devices : Timer edition

The “Hard-wired devices” are a collection of re-manufactured vintage electronic devices -such alarm clock and computer joysticks- in which two cultures of interface blend: the computer games culture and the home appliance culture. The resulting device is a fully functional new electronic object where the user can set up the time and the alarm of the clock using the computer joystick.
This project is a platform to show a part of the history of digital game culture in a exhibition space and engages an audience to know more about the history of gaming from the point of view of joysticks, their different design, types, functions, uses, history facts.
The audience will also have the chance to interact with each joystick, even if it is only to set a simple Timer.
Ultimately, this project is a celebration of gaming culture.

check his impressive presskit for details.

BIOGRAPHY

In July 2003 Roger Ibars graduated with a Master in Interaction Design from the Royal College of Art in London. Here he initiates a research interest in how objects would be loosing interest in interacting with the users. He illustrated this research by publishing the book “Self-made objects”, a collection of daily objects that experience their functions. These objects investigate a new area for interaction design where things take control of their functions and therefore use themselves. The user, left behind from this interaction, can only interact with the objects with empathy.

In 2002, Roger Ibars start to build “Hard-wired devices”, a collection of re-manufactured vintage electronic devices -such alarm clock and computer joysticks- in which two cultures of interface blend: the computer games culture and the home appliance culture.
The Hard-wired devices collection is growing year after year, they have been acquired by private collectors, sold on eBay and displayed for sale in London’s first Interaction design retail shop, the Digital Well Being Labs.

Roger Ibars has been widely exhibiting his work and presenting his particular view of Interaction Design in London (RCA), Dublin (Digital Hub), Lisbon (Design Biennale), Copenhagen (Next05), Amsterdam (Open Source Congress), Barcelona (H2O gallery, solo exhibition), Tokyo (Pecha-kucha, DesignTide), Madrid (Emotional design) and in Paris (Centre Pompidou) as part of “D.DAY Modern Day Design” exhibition during summer 2005. His work has been featured in design and art publications such as Axis Magazine in Japan, Art Investor in Germany or Make Magazine in the US.

He has also been collaborating with design schools and universities, setting up workshops to teach students how to use creatively low-tech electronic components. He has been organizing these workshops at the ECAL University of Art and design in Switzerland, the Indian Institute of Technology in New Delhi , the Ecole Nationale Superieure des arts Decoratifs in Paris, the Escola Superior de Disseny ESDI in Barcelona and the Musashino Design University of Tokyo. He has also been a Visitor Tutor for the Design Interactions course at the Royal College of Art in London.

Roger Ibars studied Sociology at Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona (1996) and graduated from Industrial Design (BA) at Escola Superior de Disseny ESDI (1999). As interaction designer he has been working for MIT Medialab Europe in Dublin, Interaction Design Research Studio at RCA, for T-mobile Creation Center in Berlin and Sony Design Center in London and Tokyo.

Roger Ibars lives and works as interaction designer in Tokyo.