Creating sound with a screen-printed MIDI textile interface

EJTech, an experimental art and tech lab based in Budapest, Hungary, has developed an experimental textile interface for sonic interactions. Esteban de la Torre and Judit Eszter Karpati are the design team behind it.

The technology is screen printed directly onto a textile surface, then through an Arduino microcontroller communicates with the desired software, using MIDI protocol. This unique interaction with the textile interface allows the medium to become part of the message, its creators say, where the interface becomes part of the process of creation itself. The controllers are managed by hand on the textile interface.

Despite the apparent contradiction, sound is a medium that has been gaining ground in the visual arts recently.The artist/technologists seek to “create synergy between the digital and physical world.” Their works have been exhibited in many countries.