Ûiiti: A treatment for ecological experience in mobile network culture
Dani Ploeger, Greenman Muleh Mbillo · Journal of Environmental Media · 2022
Ûiiti (‘the treatment’) is an Android phone app created by artist duo Greenman Muleh Mbillo, in Kenya, and Dani Ploeger, in the Netherlands. The work is a high-tech iteration of the nzevu, a ritual instrument of the Kenyan Akamba tribe. It transforms a smartphone from a networking technology with complex modes of interaction into a technology of transcendence with a minimal user interface. Through a constellation of symbolic imagery and the performance of repetitive sonic patterns, the work aims to evoke a heightened experience of the user’s immediate lifeworld.