“cammekan”…

…is an almost exact replica of Sermon’s “Telematic Vision,” only with a few supplemental changes in its set-up and to be realized through fully analogue means without any computer mediation. Identical rooms are constructed by way of inserting prosthetic structures into two out of three bays that are located at the side of the main building of Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture at Bilkent University. The middle bay that is left empty is used for entering the rooms, also providing a limited amount of visual connection between them. In each room, there exist a video monitor, a camera, and a few cubes that function as both furnishing and space-generating units. The video camera in each location sends a live video image to a video-mixer, which overlays the images received from both rooms, and displays the resulting image on the monitors in both chambers simultaneously. The participants in both rooms assume the function of the installation the moment they enter the scene and start seeing a live image of themselves next to the others that occupy the other room. “They start to explore the space and understand they are now in complete physical control of a telepresent body that can interact with the other person. The more intimate and sophisticated the interaction becomes, the further the users enter into the telematic space. The division between the remote telepresent body and actual physical body disappears, leaving only one body that exists in and between both locations.”

“Cammekan” is a vacant space of virtuality and potentiality: it is both impossible (since it does not “exist” without the presence and interactions of the participants) and possible at its best (since it allows the spectral experience of invading another’s reality, space, and even body, in ways that are not possible through physical/natural means). It also provides the means for co-presence without excluding the other from one’s space.
The name “cammekan” has a number of connotations:

a. first of all, as a joint name made up of the words cam (:glass) and mekan (:space), it refers to a third space—in no way contained or containable by the two identical rooms constructed—that exists only in virtual terms in the body of the monitor screen (which is itself made up of glass);

b. the double “m,” coinciding in order to create a three-legged/false “m,” also symbolizes both the collapse of two adjacent (physical and camera) spaces onto each other in order to create a third one and the non-actuality of this third space;

c. camekan (without the double “m”) is a word in Turkish, used to signify a box-like window-case—it can be read in both ways that are both paradoxical in themselves: (1) a transparent box with no depth, or (2) a window with its own space/depth;

d. cam is an abbreviation for the word camera (which is the main equipment that is responsible for the necessary transportation of the participants’ bodies into this non-actual space);

e. and finally, camera is at the same time etymologically and materially connected with chamber (the simplest spatial unit with an architectural shell—also referring to the two actual chambers).

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Finally, the following list lays out a series of questions to start with, setting the scene for a beginning; what happens…:

...if the function of camera as a scopic instrument which activates the desire to see “all,” replaces that of glass, which provides a domination over space in a limited perspective?

...if one confronts a situation in which he/she has to make a choice between a virtual/visual and an actual/physical presence?

...if the bodies are transported into the space of the Other so as to coexist with it?

...if there is no more 'there" where the Other exists and "here" where the Self is located?

...if the body is reduced to an eye so that the whole perceptive mechanism is left to rely solely on tele-visual sensory data?

...if the Other begins to interact with the Self in unpredictable and uncanny ways?

...if one's space is spectrally invaded by the virtual presence of others?

...if the physical space gives way to a third type of space in which experiential and material presence begin to merge into each other?

...if sound becomes the only means of assuring one's bodily presence and of "actual" interaction with the Other?

...if language is taken over by corporeal and technological means of communication?

...if the two-dimensional space of the “screen” gains a three-dimensional character, so as to generate an architectural space by itself?

...if there is no more an "outside" that can be externalized in the construction of the Self so that the boundaries of the Self are threatened at the first place?

...if we are to question the meaning of the body in relation to virtual space?: "is it possible to demonstrate anything more than a simple transposition of sensory faculties—specifically, the replacement of the sense of touch with that of sight?"