Professor Gabriella Giannachi

Professor in Performance and New Media

2423

01392 722423

Overview

Room 209

Gabriella Giannachi, Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, elected Member Academia Europaea, elected Fellow of the Asia-Pacific Artificial Intelligence Association (AAIA), is Professor in Performance and New Media, and Director of the Centre for Intermedi a and Creative Technologies at the University of Exeter, which promotes advanced interdisciplinary research in creative technologies by facilitating collaborations between academics from a range of disciplines with cultural and creative organisations.

Her publications include: On Directing, ed. with Mary Luckhurst (Methuen 1999); Staging the Post-avantgarde, co-authored with Nick Kaye (Peter Lang 2002); Virtual Theatres: an Introduction (Routledge 2004); Performing Nature: Explorations in Ecology and the Arts, ed. with Nigel Stewart (Peter Lang 2005); The Politics of New Media Theatre (Routledge 2007); Performing Presence: Between the Live and the Simulated, co-authored with Nick Kaye (MUP 2011), nominated in Theatre Library Association 44th Annual Book Awards (2012); Performing Mixed Reality, co-authored with Steve Benford (MIT Press 2011); Archaeologies of Presence, co-edited with Nick Kaye and Michael Shanks (Routledge 2012); Archive Everything: Mapping the Everyday (MIT Press 2016 and Treccani 2022); Histories of Performance Documentation: Museum, Artistic and Scholarly Practices, co-edited with Jonah Westerman (Routledge 2017); Moving Spaces, co-edited with Susanne Franco (Ca' Foscari University Press 2021); Documentation as Art, co-edited with Annet Dekker (Routledge 2023); Technologies of the Self-Portrait (Routledge 2022 and Treccani 2023).

She has published articles in Contemporary Theatre Review; Leonardo; Performance Research; Digital Creativity; Revista de Historia da Arte; Stedelijk Studies; and PAJ, and co-co-authored conference papers for ISEA 2010; IVA 2009, 9th International Conference on Intelligent Virtual Agents; CHI 2008; CHI 2009 (best paper award), CHI 2012 (best paper award); CHI 2013 (best paper award); CHI 2015; Museums and the Web.

Over the last few years, she has been researching projects in partnerships with: Tate, the Science Museum Group, The Natural History Museum, The Photographers Gallery, Royal Albert Memorial Museum and Art Gallery, the immersive media production company Factory 42, Exeter City FC Supporters Trust, Imperial War Museum, British Library, Stanford Libraries, LIMA, San Francisco Art Institute, Ludwig Boltzman Institute Media.Art.Research and Met Office Hadley Centre. She is a member of the Advisory Group of the ECFC Museum which she helped to create.

She is currently preparing a monograph on art and AI and looking into AI for art documentation in collaboration with the computer scintist Steve Benford at the University of Nottingham. She is also working on a retrofit project as pat of the Green Transition programme and completing a monograph on environmental art.

Gabriella Giannachi has a BA in Modern Languages and Literatures, in the Faculty of Letters and Philosophy from Turin University, and a PhD in English from Cambridge University, where she was awarded a scholarship by her College, Trinity Hall, to research the role of silence in modern European Drama.

In recognition of her research, she became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in 2012 and an elected member of the Academia Europaea in 2014 and elected Fellow of the Asia-Pacific Artificial Intelligence Association (AAIA) in 2024.

Research

Gabriella Giannachi is Director of the Centre for Intermedi a and Creative Technologies and her current research interests are: art and technology; mobile interpretation and user-generated documentation of art; the creation, exhibition, and sharing of archival resources within an exhibition context; mixed, augmented and virtual reality; presence research; museum studies and digital curation; new media and digital curation; oral history and digital heritage; creative technologies and public humanities; ecological and environmental practice. She welcomes research students in all these areas.

Research collaborations

Co-investigator Green Transition Ecosystem, led by Pete Walker at the University of Bath, AHRC (2024-5).

Co-investigator of BRAID, Creating a Dynamic Archive of Responsible Ecosystems in the context of Creative AI, led by Lydia Farina at the University of Nottingham, funded by AHRC (2024).

Principal Investigator of Documenting digital art: re-thinking histories and practices of documentation in the museum with Dr Annet Dekker (University of Amsterdam), Dr Katrina Sluis (UWA), Gaby Wijers (LIMA), and Dr Francesca Franco (University of Exeter), in partnership with LIMA, The Photographers Gallery, and the Venice Biennale, funded by the AHRC (2019-24).

Co-Investigator of the AHRC funded 'The Connected Museum project', PI Steve Benford *University of Nottingham, UK partners, Tate and Factory 42 (2020-22).

Co-Investigator of Innovate UK funded collaboration led by Factory 42 with the Science Museum Group, The Natural History Museum, Magic Leap and the Almedia Theatre (2019-2020).

Principal investigator of The Grecian Archive and the HLF-funded The History of St James Park project (2016-17), The City Museum (2017-19) and the Celebrating Our Heritage: an ECFC Museum Outreach Programme' (2019-2020) developed in partnership with Exeter City Football Club and Exeter City Footbal Club Supporters Trust.

Co-Investigator of the EU funded Children's Photography Archive led by Melissa Nolas at Goldsmiths College (2029-2020).

Principal Investigator for Collecting, Archiving and Sharing Performance and the Performative, with Dr Jennifer Mundy (Tate Research), Mr John Stack (Tate Online) and Catherine Wood (Curator for Performance at Tate), funded by AHRC (2014-16).

Co-investigator for Performance and Audience in Movement-Based Digital Games: An International Research Network, PI Patrick Dickinson (ComputerScience, University of Lincoln), funded by AHRC (2014-15).

Principal investigator for Exeter in the RCUK funded Horizon Digital Economy Research, Universities of Nottingham, Cambridge, Brunel and Reading (2009-15 and 2015-2020):

Principal investigator, togethwer with Steve Benford, Tony Glover and Martin Flintham) of the pilot for The Cartography project developed in partnership with Rebecca Sinker, Helena Hunter, Emily Pringle, Acacia Finbow, Valentina Ravaglia at Tate (2016-17).
Principal investigator, together with Derek McAuley (Director at Horizon Digital Economy Research Institute and Chief Innovation Officer at Connected Digital Economy Catapult), for Art Maps, an interdisciplinary collaborative project between three departments at Tate (Tate Learning, Tate Online and Tate Research) and researchers in Computer Science at the University of Nottingham (2012-13). Art Maps consists of a web and mobile app that allow users to explore artworks in the Tate collection in relation to the places, sites, landscapes and environments that informed or led to their geotagging. The research process is documented on the project blog, and there are videos or the first and second public engagement events held at Tate. Art Maps was shown at Tate Britain from February to June 2013.
Co-Investigator for Relate, a collaboration between Active Ingredient, Dr Carlo Buontempo from the Met Office Hadley Centre, Brazilian curator Silvia Leal, staff in Computer Science and Psychology from University of Nottingham, and a number of communities in Brazil and the UK (2012). Relate developed sensor kits and an online sharing platform supporting remote communities in reflecting about the relationship between energy and climate change. The platform facilitates mass participation in citizen science activities, allowing for communities to collect, share, relate and interpret data gathered through environmental sensors and energy monitors. Activities supported include building data maps, constructing and sharing new interpretations and artistic visualisations of the data, and facilitating discussions and questions about our understanding of energy and climate change between schools, communities, artists and researchers in the humanities and sciences. The research is documented in a blog
Principal investigator for CloudPad, a cloud-based documentation and archiving tool for the annotation of mixed media resources. Developed in partnership with British Library, Stanford Libraries, Blast Theory, CloudPad was tested through the annotation of a bespoke documentation of Blast Theory's Rider Spoke (2009) captured in collaboration with the Ludwig Boltzman Institute Media.Art.Research. The research is documented in a blog.

Principal investigator for The Exeter Time Trails, funded by REACT HEIF (2013), developed in collaboration with RAMM, 1010 Media and Exeter City FC Supporters Trust. Exeter Time Trails is a web app prototype that facilitates the exploration of 250,000 years of history through objects in RAMM’s collection and oral histories from partner institutions, such as Exeter City FC Supporters Trust. The research is documented in a blog. Exeter Time Trails subsequently was funded by an open innovation token which led to the development of Placeify

Principal Investigator for Moor Stories: Reimagining the Dartmoor landscape, with Royal Albert Memorial Museum and Art Gallery and 1010 Media, funded by REACT HEIF (2012) and REACT (2013). This project utilised research on user engagement, location and Victorian collections to develop an interactive website entailing an archive of RAMM's collection of objects pertaining to Dartmoor that can be encountered and annotated outside the museum. The research is documented in a blog

Co-investigator for Mapping Performance Art in the Bay Area, a visualisation of performance in the Bay area from the late 1960s to the mid 1980s (2009-13).

Principal Investigator, commissioned by AHRC, Nesta and Arts Council to research Imperial War Museum's SICE project (2012), which explored how social media models can be applied to museum collections, offering new frameworks for engagement and social interpretation. The SICE project was mentioned in the Guardian and the final report is here

Co-investigator for Riders Have Spoken, AHRC, led by J. Foster, Information Studies, Sheffield University (2010-11). This project led to Blast Theory's development of an archive of their work Rider Spoke.

Co-investigator for Performing Presence, developed in collaboration with University College London (Mel Slater, David Swapp, Computer Science) and Stanford University (Michael Shanks, Archaeology and Classics, Metamedia Lab) funded by the AHRC (2004-9). The Presence Project investigated what constitutes presence in live, mediated and simulated environments.

Mentor to Watching the Detectives. Investigations of the Event, its Record and the Aesthetics of Witnessing (2008-11) led by Hugo Glendinning, funded by the AHRC. This project looked at the role of the photographer in generating performance documentation.

Partner to Creator (2008-9) New Research Processes and Business Models for the Creative Industries, EPSRC-funded cluster led by S. Benford (Mixed Reality Lab, Nottingham University).

Member of EPSRC funded cluster in digital economy Innovative Media for a Digital Economy IMDE (2008-9) led by M. Jirotka (Oxford University).

Partner to CEMP, a creativity network, funded by AHRC, Arts Council England, DTI and ESRC (2006-8).

Investigator for PRESENCCIA, subcontracted to UPF Barcelona (2006-7), EU funded. Presenccia researched presence in virtual environments.

Principal investigator for ISN | Information Society Network, funded by University of Exeter (2006-9), to explore the potential of interdisciplinary collaboration on the information society.

Supervision

I supervise students in a number of areas including contemporary performance and new media, including AI, documentation, and conservation.

Research students

Current Students

Miao Wang 'The Fluid Space: the dilemma of constructing the subjective self in the Chinese social media environment-A study with the approach of Contemporary Art Practice'

Lin Zhang 'Enhancing family learning in museums'

Jo Sutherst, 'The algorithmic gaze and its impact on our sense of human identity'

Sebastian Bustamante, 'Archiving Memory: The Challenges of Participatory Digital Memory Spaces in Latin America', Doctoral College award

Past Students

Lucy McFadzean, 'Video, community, and political support in the cultural policy of the Greater London Council, 1981-83, SWWDTP award

Acacia Finbough, 'The value of performance documentation', AHRC funded collaborative doctoral studentship with Tate (2019)

Sofia Romualdo, 'Gameful design in museums', colelaborative doctoral studentship with RAMM (2019)

William Barrett, 'Digital Interaction with Heritage at the Royal Albert Memorial Museum and Art Gallery', REACT collaborative doctoral studentship with RAMM (2019)

Yi-Chen Wu, ‘Chi in Multimedia Taiwanese Theatre’, Taiwanese Government scholarship (2016)

Ilaria Pinna, ‘The politics of contemporary Italian theatre' (2016)

Dan Frodsham, 'Utopic Spatial Practice', AHRC (2015)

Stephanie Kuhn, 'Presence in Hyperoperas', AHRC (2010)

Sandra Reeve, ‘The Ecological Body’, AHRC, in co-supervision with Professor Phillip Zarrilli (2008)

Hannah Wood, Creative writing PhD, co-supervision with Sam North (2017)

Publications

_{Copyright Notice: Any articles made available for download are for personal use only. Any other use requires prior permission of the author and the copyright holder.}

| 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011 | 2010 | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2002 | 1999 | 1992 | 1991 |

2023

Giannachi G. (2023) Documenting Hybrid Mixed Media Art Forms: The Role of the Audience, Conservation of Contemporary Art, Springer Nature, 217-233, DOI:10.1007/978-3-031-42357-4_12.
Giannachi G. (2023) Framing Humans for AI, Journal for the Philosophy of Language, Mind and the Arts, volume 4, no. 1, pages 45-64, DOI:10.30687/Jolma/2723-9640/2023/01/003.
Giannachi G. (2023) Lost Origin and Beyond. Towards a design framework for mixed reality theatrical experiences, Body Space & Technology, volume 22, no. 1, DOI:10.16995/bst.9674.

2022

Dekker A, Giannachi G. (2022) Documentation as Art Expanded Digital Practices, Taylor & Francis.
Giannachi G. (2022) Technologies of the Self-Portrait: Identity, Presence and the Construction of the Subject(s) in Twentieth and Twenty-First Century Art, DOI:10.4324/9780429468483.
Bird JM, Smart PA, Harris DJ, Phillips LA, Giannachi G, Vine SJ. (2022) A Magic Leap in Tourism: Intended and Realized Experience of Head-Mounted Augmented Reality in a Museum Context, Journal of Travel Research, DOI:10.1177/00472875221134031.
Giannachi G, Federici CAG, Guzzo MSL. (2022) Presença ambiental, OuvirOUver, volume 17, no. 2, pages 524-536, DOI:10.14393/ouv-v17n2a2021-61584.
Giannachi G. (2022) Documenting the Participants’ Points of View: Re-Thinking the Epistemology of Participation, Participatory Practices in Art and Cultural Heritage, Springer Nature, 13-23, DOI:10.1007/978-3-031-05694-9_2.

2021

Giannachi G. (2021) The Role of Performance in Environmental Humanities: The Case of Joan Jonas’s Moving Off the Land II, Lagoonscapes, no. 1, DOI:10.30687/lgsp//2021/01/009.
Franco S, Giannachi G. (2021) Moving Spaces. Enacting Dance, Performance, and the Digital in the Museum.
Franco S, Giannachi G. (2021) Introduction Moving Spaces, Rewriting Museology Through Practice, Moving Spaces Enacting Dance, Performance, and the Digital in the Museum, Edizioni Ca Foscari, DOI:10.30687/978-88-6969-534-6/000.
Franco S, Giannachi G. (2021) Task by Eleanor Sikorski, Moving Spaces Enacting Dance, Performance, and the Digital in the Museum, Edizioni Ca Foscari, DOI:10.30687/978-88-6969-534-6/001.
Franco S, Giannachi G. (2021) Task by Ana Pi A Still and Warm Dance to a Space, Moving Spaces Enacting Dance, Performance, and the Digital in the Museum, Edizioni Ca Foscari, DOI:10.30687/978-88-6969-534-6/003.
Franco S, Giannachi G. (2021) Task by Quim Bigas, Moving Spaces Enacting Dance, Performance, and the Digital in the Museum, Edizioni Ca Foscari, DOI:10.30687/978-88-6969-534-6/005.
Franco S, Giannachi G. (2021) Task by Monica Gillette, Moving Spaces Enacting Dance, Performance, and the Digital in the Museum, Edizioni Ca Foscari, DOI:10.30687/978-88-6969-534-6/007.
Franco S, Giannachi G. (2021) Task by Ingrid Bergen Myhre, Moving Spaces Enacting Dance, Performance, and the Digital in the Museum, Edizioni Ca Foscari, DOI:10.30687/978-88-6969-534-6/009.
Franco S, Giannachi G. (2021) Task by Ariadne Mikou A Casual Meditation for Anywhere and Anytime, Moving Spaces Enacting Dance, Performance, and the Digital in the Museum, Edizioni Ca Foscari, DOI:10.30687/978-88-6969-534-6/011.
Giannachi G. (2021) Into the Space of the Digital Museum, Moving Spaces Enacting Dance, Performance, and the Digital in the Museum, Edizioni Ca Foscari, DOI:10.30687/978-88-6969-534-6/012.
Franco S, Giannachi G. (2021) Task by Masako Matsushita, Moving Spaces Enacting Dance, Performance, and the Digital in the Museum, Edizioni Ca Foscari, DOI:10.30687/978-88-6969-534-6/013.

2019

Giannachi G, Sinker R, Benford S, Finbow A, Hunter H, Ravaglia V, Pringle E, Glover T. (2019) The Cartography Project: Towards a Relational Form of Documentation, the Case of Participatory Art Practices in Museums and Art Galleries, Digital Cultural Heritage, Springer Nature, 315-329, DOI:10.1007/978-3-030-15200-0_21.
Giannachi G. (2019) Documenting digital art: the role of the audience, Bridging the Gap Theory and Practice in the Conservation of Contemporary Art, Maastricht, 24th - 27th Mar 2019.

2018

Benford S, Greenhalgh C, Giannachi G, Walker B, Marshall J, Tennent P, Rodden T. (2018) Discomfort—The Dark Side of Fun, Funology 2, Springer Nature, 209-224, DOI:10.1007/978-3-319-68213-6_13.
Flinn A. (2018) Gabriella Giannachi, Archive Everything: Mapping the Everyday, Edinburgh University Press, DOI:10.1080/17583489.2018.1477656. [PDF]
Giannachi G, Sinker R, Benford S, Glover T, Hunter H, Ravaglia V, Finbow A, Carletti L, Pringle E. (2018) The Cartography project: documenting participatory practices in museums and art galleries, Digital Cultural Heritage, Berlin, 30th Aug - 1st Sep 2017.

2017

Giannachi G. (2017) Afterword The intention of the artist and the point of view of the audience, Histories of Performance Documentation, Taylor & Francis, 182-197, DOI:10.4324/9781315645384-17.
Giannachi G. (2017) San Francisco museum of modern art: Jill Sterrett, director of collections and conservation; Rudolf Frieling, curator for media arts; and Frank Smigiel, associate curator for performance and film, Histories of Performance Documentation: Museum, Artistic, and Scholarly Practices, 35-41, DOI:10.4324/9781315645384.
Tolmie P, Giannachi G. (2017) On Becoming an Audience: If Tate Modern was Musée de la danse?, MoMa Dance: Boris Charmatz.
Giannachi G. (2017) Who decides who participates? Rethinking the epistemology of participation, Participatory practices in arts and heritage, Maastricht, 17th - 18th Mar 2017.
Giannachi G, Kwastek K, Tolmie P, Benford S, Lowood H, Clausen B, Wood K, Osborn J. (2017) Histories of Performance Documentation: Museum, Artistic and Scholarly Practices, Routledge.

2016

Giannachi G. (2016) Live Archive: A brief history of Ant Farm Media Van v.08 [Time Capsule] by Chip Lord, Curtis Schreier, Bruce Tomb, The Present is the Form of All Life: Ant Farm’s Time Capsules 1968-2015, Pioneer Works.
Giannachi G, Dekker A, van Saale V. (2016) Expanding documentation and making the most of the cracks in the wall, Documenting Performance, Methuen.
Giannachi G. (2016) Unfolding performance, Unfold, Amsterdam.
Giannachi G. (2016) Performance, the document, and the digital: the case of Lynn Hershman Leeson’s ‘Robertas’, Digital Humanities 2016, Krakow, 11th - 15th Jul 2016.
Giannachi G. (2016) Archive Everything:mapping the everyday, MIT Press.
Giannachi G. (2016) Copy, Cut, Paste – Humans (Re-)Printed: Lynn Hershman Leeson’s The Infinity Engine (2014-), Performance and the Medical Body, Methuen.

2015

Giannachi G. (2015) Documenting the user experience, Revista de Historia da Arte, pages 32-46.
Benford S, Greenhalgh C, Anderson B, Jacobs R, Golembewski M, Jirotka M, Stahl BC, Timmermans J, Giannachi G, Adams M. (2015) The ethical implications of HCI's turn to the cultural, ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, volume 22, no. 5, DOI:10.1145/2775107.
Coughlan T, Carletti L, Giannachi G, Benford S, McAuley D, Price D, Locatelli C, Sinker R, Stack J. (2015) ArtMaps: Interpreting the Spatial Footprints of Artworks, CHI, Seoul, Korea, 18th - 23rd Apr 2015.

2014

Carletti L, Price D, Giannachi G, Sinker R, McAuley D, Stack J. (2014) Art Maps - Putting the Tate Collection on the Map, Electronic Workshops in Computing, DOI:10.14236/ewic/eva2014.17.
Giannachi G, Sinker R, Stack J, Locatelli C, Carletti L, Price D, McAuley D, Coughlan T, Benford S. (2014) ArtMaps, Nodem, Warsaw, Poland, 1st - 3rd Dec 2014, http://repo.nodem.org.
Giannachi G, McAuley D, Sinker R, Stack J, Price D, Carletti L, Coughlan T, Locatelli C, Benford S. (2014) ArtMaps, DOI:10.5281/zenodo.11770. [PDF]
Locatelli C, Giannachi G, Sinker R. (2014) Art-Mapping Smart-Cities: Accessing Art Collections Outside the Museum, Museums and the Web 2014.
Carletti L, Coughlan T, Christensen J, Gerber J, Giannachi G, Schutt S, Sinker R, Denner Dos Santos C. (2014) Structures for Knowledge Co-creation Between Organisations and the Public, Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing, Baltimore.
Giannachi G, Barrett W, Farley P, Chapman A, Cadbury T, Lawrence R, Burbage H. (2014) Time Trails: ‘presencing’ digital heritage within our everyday lives, Revista Brasileira de Estudos da Presenca, volume 4, no. 1, pages 97-114. [PDF]

2013

Giannachi G, Barrett W, Lawrence R, Cadbury T, Burbage H, Chapman A, Farley P. (2013) Exeter Time Trails, Nodem, Stockholm, 1st - 4th Dec 2013, http://repo.nodem.org/?objectId=115.
Sinker R, Giannachi G, Carletti L. (2013) Art maps - mapping the multiple meanings of place, International Journal of Art and Design Education, volume 32, no. 3, pages 362-373, DOI:10.1111/j.1476-8070.2013.12025.x.
Benford S, Greenhalgh C, Giannachi G, Walker B, Marshall J, Rodden T. (2013) Uncomfortable user experience, Communications of the ACM, volume 56, no. 9, pages 66-73, DOI:10.1145/2500468.2500889.
Benford S, Greenhalgh C, Crabtree A, Flintham M, Walker B, Marshall J, Koleva B, Egglestone SR, Giannachi G, Adams M. (2013) Performance-led research in the wild, ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, volume 20, no. 3, DOI:10.1145/2491500.2491502.
Giannachi G. (2013) Documenting Performance: Playing and Replaying Archives of Art and Heritage, ATHE 2013, Orlando, Florida, 1st - 5th Aug 2013.
Carletti L, Price D, Sinker R, Giannachi G, McAuley D, Stack J, Beaver K, Mundy J. (2013) Art Mapping in Paris, CHI 2013, Paris, 27th Apr - 2nd May 2013, DOI:10.1145/2468356.2479602.
Carletti L, Giannachi G, Price D, McAuley D. (2013) Digital Humanities and Crowdsourcing: An Exploration, Digital Humanities and Crowdsourcing: An ExplorationMW2013: Museums and the Web 2013, Portland, Or, 17th - 20th Apr 2013, http://mw2013.museumsandtheweb.com/paper/digital-humanities-and-crowdsourcing-an-exploration-4/.
Giannachi G. (2013) KEYNOTE ADDRESS: Documenting the user experience: the cases of Blast Theory's Rider Spoke, Tate's Art Maps, RAMM's Moor Stories and Exeter Time Trails, Performing Documentation in the Conservation of Contemporary Art, Lisbon, 20th - 21st Jun 2013.
Jacobs R, Benford S, Selby M, Golembewski M, Price D, Giannachi G. (2013) A conversation between trees: What data feels like in the forest, Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - Proceedings, pages 129-138, DOI:10.1145/2470654.2470673.

2012

Giannachi G. (2012) Environmental presence, Archaeologies of Presence, 50-63, DOI:10.4324/9780203126738.
Etchells T, Giannachi G, Kaye N. (2012) Looking back: A conversation about presence, 2006, pages 183-194, DOI:10.4324/9780203126738.
Giannachi G, Kaye N, Shanks M. (2012) Archaeologies of presence, DOI:10.4324/9780203126738.
Giannachi G, Kaye N, Shanks M. (2012) Introduction: Archaeologies of presence, Archaeologies of Presence, 1-25, DOI:10.4324/9780203126738.
Giannachi G, Tolmie P. (2012) Info-Objects: Embedding Objects with Audience Interpretation, Imperial War Museum: Social Interpretation Research and Development Report.
Kaye N, Giannachi G, Hertz B-S, Weiner A. (2012) Audience as Subject, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts.
Benford S, Giannachi G. (2012) Interaction as performance, Interactions, volume 19, no. 3, pages 38-43, DOI:10.1145/2168931.2168941.
Benford S, Greenhalgh C, Giannachi G, Walker B, Marshall J, Rodden T. (2012) 'Uncomfortable Interactions', ACM, pages 2005-2014, DOI:10.1145/2207676.2208347.
Giannachi G, Lowood H, Worthey G, Price D, Rowland D, Benford S. (2012) Documenting Mixed Reality Performance: the case of CloudPad, Digital Creativity, pages 1-17, DOI:10.1080/14626268.2012.656274.

2011

Giannachi G, Jacobs R, Benford S. (2011) Performing Nature's Footprint, Visual and Performing Arts, Atiner, 393-404.
Giannachi G. (2011) The Making of Empty Stages by Tim Etchells and HUgo Glendinning, Leonardo Electronic Almanac, volume 17, no. 1, pages 124-131. [PDF]
Kaye N, Giannachi G. (2011) Acts of presence: Performance, mediation, virtual reality, TDR - The Drama Review - A Journal of Performance Studies, volume 55, no. 4, pages 88-95, DOI:10.1162/DRAM_a_00124.
Benford S, Crabtree A, Flintham M, Greenhalgh C, Koleva B, Adams M, Tandavanitj N, Farr JR, Giannachi G, Lindt I. (2011) Creating the spectacle: Designing interactional trajectories through spectator interfaces, ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, volume 18, no. 3, DOI:10.1145/1993060.1993061.
Giannachi G, Kaye N. (2011) Performing Presence: Between the LIve and the Simulated, Manchester University Press.
Benford S, Giannachi G. (2011) Performing Mixed Reality, MITP.

2010

Foster J, Benford S, Chamberlain A, Rowland D, Giannachi G. (2010) Riders Have Spoken: A practice-based approach to developing an information architecture for the archiving and replay of a mixed reality performance, International Journal of Performance Arts & Digital Media, volume 6, no. 2, pages 209-223.
Giannachi G, Price D, Rowland D, Benford S. (2010) CloudPad documentation and archiving tool. [PDF]
Giannachi G, Rowland D, Benford S, Price D. (2010) The Documentation and Archiving of Mixed Media Experiences: the Case of Rider Spoke', Digital Futures, Nottingham, 11th - 13th Oct 2010. [PDF]
Giannachi G, Rowland D, Benford S, Foster J, Adams M, Chamberlain A. (2010) Blast Theory's Rider Spoke, its Documentation and the Making of its Replay Archive, Contemporary Theatre Review, volume 20, no. 3, pages 353-+, DOI:10.1080/10486801.2010.489047.
Leeson LH, Giannachi G. (2010) Lynn Hershman Leeson in Conversation of Gabriella Giannachi, Leonardo, volume 43, no. 3, pages 232-+.
Wilkie A, Gaver W, Hemment D, Giannachi G. (2010) Creative Assemblages: Organisation and outputs of practice-led research, Leonardo, volume 43, no. 1, pages 98-99.
Chamberlain A, Rowland D, Foster J, Giannachi G. (2010) Riders Have Spoken: Replaying and Archiving Pervasive Performances, Leonardo, volume 43, no. 1, pages 90-91.
Steve Benford, Giannachi G. (2010) Performing Mixed Reality, MITP.
Giannachi G. (2010) Performing Mixed Reality, MITP.
Chamberlain A, Rowland D, Foster J, Giannachi G. (2010) Riders Have Spoken: Replaying and Archiving Pervasive Performances, Leonardo, volume 43, no. 1, pages 98-99.
Wilkie A, Gaver W, Hemment D, Giannachi G. (2010) Creative Assemblages: Organisation and Outputs of Practice-Led Research, Leonardo, volume 43, no. 1, pages 90-91.

2009

Benford S, Giannachi G, Koleva B, Rodden T. (2009) From Interaction to Trajectories: Designing Coherent Journeys Through User Experience, CHI 2009, Boston, Massachusetts, ACM Press.
Giannachi G, Gillies, M, Kaye, N, Swapp, D. (2009) Mediating Performance Through Virtual Agents, IVA 2009, 9th International Conference on Intelligent virtual Agents, Amsterdam.
Giannachi G. (2009) Temporal Convergence in Shared Networked Narratives: the case of Blast Theory's Day of the Figurines, Leonardo, volume 42:5, no. October.
Giannachi G. (2009) San Francisco museum of modern art - The art of participation: 1950 to now, Digital Creativity, volume 20, no. 1-2, pages 125-131, DOI:10.1080/14626260902875223.
Benford S, Giannachi G. (2009) Temporal Convergence in Shared Networked Narratives: The Case of Blast Theory's Day of the Figurines, Leonardo, volume 42, no. 5, pages 443-448.

2008

Benford S, Giannachi G. (2008) Temporal Trajectories in Shared Interactive Narratives, CHI 2008, Florence, Italy, ACM Press, DOI:10.1145/1357054.1357067.
Giannachi G, Benford S. (2008) Temporal Expansion in Blast Theory's 'Day of the Figurines', PAJ, pages 60-69, DOI:10.1162/pajj.2008.30.3.60.
Adams M, Benford S, Giannachi G. (2008) Pervasive Presence: Blast Theory's 'Day of the Figurines', Contemporary Theatre Review, volume 18, no. 2, pages 219-235, DOI:10.1080/10486800801912622.

2007

Flintham M, Giannachi G, Benford S, Adams M. (2007) Day of the Figurines: Supporting Episodic Storytelling on Mobile Phones, Virtual Storytelling. Using Virtual Reality Technologies for Storytelling, Springer Nature, 167-175, DOI:10.1007/978-3-540-77039-8_14.
Giannachi G. (2007) Carnal art: Orlan's refacing, CONTEMPORARY THEATRE REVIEW, volume 17, no. 3, pages 463-465. [PDF]
Giannachi G. (2007) Telepresence & bio art: Networking humans, rabbits & robots, CONTEMPORARY THEATRE REVIEW, volume 17, no. 3, pages 463-465. [PDF]
Flintham M, Giannachi G, Benford S, Adams M. (2007) Day of the Figurines: Supporting episodic storytelling on mobile phones, 4th International Conference on Virtual Storytelling, St Malo, France, 5th - 7th Dec 2007, Virtual Storytelling, Proceedings, volume 4871, pages 167-175, DOI:10.1007/978-3-540-77039-8.
Giannachi G. (2007) The Politics of New Media Theatre: Life®™, Routledge.
Giannachi G. (2007) Intermediality in theatre and performance, THEATRE RESEARCH INTERNATIONAL, volume 32, no. 3, pages 333-334, DOI:10.1017/S0307883307003227. [PDF]
Giannachi G. (2007) STELARC: The monograph, CONTEMPORARY THEATRE REVIEW, volume 17, no. 3, pages 463-465. [PDF]

2006

Giannachi G. (2006) The politics of new media theatre: Life®™, DOI:10.4324/9780203695142.
Giannachi, G.. (2006) Politics New Media Theatre, Routledge.
Giannachi G. (2006) Exposing globalisation: Biopolitics in the work of critical art ensemble, Contemporary Theatre Review, volume 16, no. 1, pages 41-50, DOI:10.1080/10486800500450973.
Giannachi G, Kaye N. (2006) Presence, a short definition, Performance Research, volume 11, article no. 3.

2005

Giannachi G, Stewart N. (2005) Performing Nature: Explorations in Ecology and the Arts, Peter Lang.

2004

Giannachi G. (2004) Virtual theatres: An introduction, DOI:10.4324/9780203500033.
Giannachi G. (2004) Virtual Theatres: an Introduction, Routledge.

2002

Giannachi G, Kaye N. (2002) Staging the Post-Avant-Garde: Italian Experimental Performance after 1970, Peter Lang.

1999

Giannachi G, Luckhurst M. (1999) On Directing, Faber and Faber.

1992

Giannachi G. (1992) ‘Divina Two’ in Turin, New Theatre Quarterly, volume 8, no. 30, pages 193-194, DOI:10.1017/S0266464X00006643.
Giannachi G, Goodman L. (1992) Which Freedom, an overview of contemporary Bulgarian theatre, New Theatre Quarterly, volume 8, no. 32, pages 362-376.
GIANNACHI G. (1992) DIVINA-2 IN TURIN - A CONFERENCE HELD IN ITALY IN JUNE 1991, NEW THEATRE QUARTERLY, volume 8, no. 30, pages 193-194, DOI:10.1017/S0266464X00006643. [PDF]

1991

Giannachi G, Goodman L. (1991) A Theater for urban renewal, New Theatre Quarterly, volume 7, no. 25, pages 27-34.

External impact and engagement

I research performance and new media documentation, a burgeoning field that concerns itself with the capture of rich quality data about an event (whether artistic or other) so it may be preserved for future generations. More precisely, I am an expert at documenting mixed reality events that span physical and digital environments and the use of AI in documentation. This has led me to research how documentations and, more generally, the archives that host them, can be used outside the museums as mobile centres for interpretation and knowledge production to facilitate creative engagement with art, heritage, popular and material culture. In particular, I research how mobile interpretation and creative engagement with such archives can generate new knowledge that is of value to users and museums; how encountering archival materials outside museums can bring return visitors as well as new visitors to museums; how the self-documentation of one’s encounter with art and heritage can constitute a rewarding learning experience; how it can stimulate memory and augment individual and communities’ sense of identity, presence and well being; and what accessibility implications these uses of documentations may entail.

Teaching

I draw from my research in all my teaching and the principal areas in which I teach are performance and new media, including AI; documentation and archiving; museum studies and curation; environmental humanities and public humanities.

I teach through a problem-solving, hands on approach and, when possible, try to collaborate with external institutions, such as Royal Albert Memorial Museum and Art Gallery, Bill Douglas Cinema Museum, Exeter City Football Museum, the Penguin Archive, and the Northcott Theatre.

I am an ASPIRE Higher Education Academy Senior Fellow.

To make an appointment with me, please email me: g.giannachi@exeter.ac.uk and let me know if you prefer an in person or on campus appointment

Modules taught

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