KAMI

KAMI is an Automated Purification Ceremony designed to start first time meditators down a new Journey of Mental Wellbeing. By 2030 depression may account for the largest global ‘disease burden’, ahead of common illnesses such as diabetes and heart disease . Many designs focus of producing objects to increase our efficiency, convenience and physical comfort, yet studies have shown the Western subjective well-being levels are roughly the same as the were in the 1950s, despite all our advances in these areas .

KAMI is an object designed with a different purpose, an artifact to inspire the beginning of a journey towards mental health through Mindfulness Meditation. The user sits beneath KAMI, which then automatically closes around them, an audio track then guides the user through 10 minutes of guided meditation. When the user is ready to leave they stand, and KAMI will rise. The user then re-enters the external space, perhaps with a tiny fragment of clarity to see the world anew. It is the designers hope that this experience may act as a catalyst to the user to investigate and start their own mental heath training practise.

KAMI was designed and built by Freyja Sewell during a residency at Hackerfarm in Kamogawa, Japan, concluding two years living and researching in Japan as a Daiwa Scholar. During her two years Freyja investigated different types of mind training, including Tea Ceremony, Shinto Purification and Zen Meditation. She observed that all the different approaches used tools, processes and objects to create a clear separation from the distracting outer world and inner landscape of sensations. KAMI is a physical representation of this separation, by blocking external distraction to create visual silence Freyja intendes to make it easier for first time meditators to, perhaps for the first time, focus on their inner state.