Adnan presented the boattr.uk project during the DRHA conference, in form of a paper and as a 360 video installation.

This 360 video installation lets the conference visitor experience the ‘boattr’ project through a VR headset, and access the boattr micro-computer book over any WiFi enabled device. The installation encompasses a photographic triptych showcasing canal life, a seating representing a narrow boat’s bow on which the viewer can sit and immerse into a journey on the narrow boat Quintessence. With the evolution the moving image inserted itself into broader, everyday use, but also extended its patterns of effect and its aesthetical language. Video has become pervasive, importing the principles of “tele-” and “cine-” into the human and social realm, thereby also propelling “image culture” to new heights and intensities. The boattr 360 installation makes use of video as theory, reflecting the structural and qualitative re-evaluation it aims at discussing design and organisational level. In accordance with the qualitatively new situation video is set in, the installation presents a multi-dimensional matrix which constitutes the virtual logical grid of the boattr project. The installation translates online modes into physical matter (micro computer), thereby reflecting on logics of new formats – by rendering a dynamic, open structure, allowing for access to the boattr micro-computer book over the ‘boattr’ WiFi SSID.

The boattr DIY infrastructures offer a unique set of special affordances for local services to the narrow boat community, outside the public Internet: the ownership and control of the whole design process that promotes independence and grass-roots innovation rather than fear of data shadows; the de facto physical proximity of those connected without the need for disclosing private location information, such as GPS coordinates, to third parties; the easy and inclusive access through the use of a local captive portal launched automatically when one joins the network; the option for anonymous interactions; and the materiality of the network itself.

DRHA (Digital Research in the Humanities and Arts) continues to be a key gathering that brings together the creators, users, distributors, and custodians of digital research and resources in the arts, design and humanities to explore the capturing, archiving and communication of complex and creative research processes. DRHA is rapidly expanding in the contemporary global context of arts, sciences, education, communication- and information- economies and the creative industries. DRHA provides a forum for debate across these areas focusing on the interchange between disciplines concerning the use of new technologies relating to knowledge, communication and creative practice. This takes place within a context of rapidly expanding technological infiltration throughout all areas of life, causing changes that are irreversible. It is our belief that certain digital practices both critique and influence the social and political, in as much as they question the very nature of our accepted ideas and belief systems regarding new technologies.

Over recent years DRHA has broadened its field of enquiry from the humanities to include many distinctive disciplines in the arts. Previous conferences at Dartington, Cambridge, Queen’s University Belfast, Brunel University, the University of Nottingham’s Ningbo campus in Shanghai, the University of Winchester, the University of Greenwich, Dublin City University, the University of Brighton and most recently Plymouth University, have welcomed colleagues from many research fields and professional backgrounds, from academia, creative industries and the worlds of performance and fine art. At the same time, DRHA has strived for the provision of intellectual and physical space for cross-disciplinary discussion and ideas generation.