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People have been fascinated by the "uncanny" for centuries as it is both a powerful and mysterious feeling. The uncanny is a strange feeling of discomfort and disease when something is recognizable but also not at the same time. This paradoxical experience is a mix of the familiar and the strange which evokes a powerful emotional response that is often in the realms of fear and discomfort. It is for this reason that uncanny has become a rich topic of discussion in many areas of exploration including psychology literature, film, design and even robotics. It allows for an understanding of the relationship that we have with the world, especially when it triggers a discomforting feeling.

My preferred definition of “the uncanny” comes from Freud’s essay written in 1919 titled “The Uncanny” (or “Das Unheimlich” in the original German). He defined the uncanny as “that class of frightening which leads back to what is known of old and long familiar.” Freud also believed that “in reality nothing new or alien, but something which is familiar and old-established in the mind, and which has become alienated from it only through the process of repression.” This emphasizes the core paradox of the uncanny, that it is not simply the absence of something, but rather the disconcerting electroshock of revealing what has been hidden of repressed, inverted, the familiar and strange. “Unheimlich” is the German term which means “unhomely,” reinforcing the notion of something that is supposed to warm and give a sense of safety, but instead is makes one feel restless.

The uncanny involves deep-seated discomfort that emerges from a mix of the familiar and the foreign. In studing the uncanny, scholars acknowledge that the perplexing feeling of the ‘uncanny’ surfaces due to a myriad of factors.

The Return of the Repressed: In Freud’s theory, repression explains how the uncanny arises from the familiar. It suggests that the uncanny surfaces when the ‘something’ known to someone and residing in their mind suddenly emerges in a distorted or unfamiliar way.

The Double (Doppelgänger): Owing to the fact that the uncanny challenges a person’s individuality, the involvement of the self or duplicate self can evoke the uncanny.

Animate/Inanimate Ambiguity: Objects that spark the uncertainty of the existence of life or death, e.g. dolls and automatons, evoke a sense of unease and enigma.

The Uncanny Valley: In the realm of robotics and digital human creation, discomfort emerges when subtle shading of movement, expression, and appearance makes the entity not completely human.

Violation of Social Norms: A human-like entity that seems to have arbitrary, expressionless, voice, tone, or gaze can evoke unease.

Blurring Boundaries: The new uncanny can emerge from advanced AI or synthetic biology whereby such technology defies the boundaries of nature and artifice, human and non-human, or mechanism and consciousness, thus creating a kind of existential discomfort that transcends the mere physical form.

Perfect Simulation: Contemporary AI's capability of seamlessly simulating human thinking processes and expressions, instead of just copying them, raises disturbing questions regarding the core difference between real and synthetic intelligence.

Auditory Disturbances: The role sound plays is pivotal, from disembodied and unsettling voices, the robotic utterances of disembodied individuals, to the reconstruction of the human voice through archival synthesis and subtle but surprising sonic traces embedded in soundscapes.

All of these strategies aim to combine and defy our perception of accepted reality, bend our expectations, and stir feelings of dread pertaining to the known and the unknown.

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1. Ron Mueck, Ghost (1998) - Sculpture

Mueck’s sculptures are famous for his human depictions being in distorted and hyper-realistic proportions and at unnerving scales.

Mueck’s works, such as "Ghost," depict people with exquisite detail, but their scale can make them feel both familiar and strange. The uncanny comes from the unusual stillness, creating a “double” that is almost alive but not quite.

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2. Zdzisław Beksiński, Untitled (1970s) - Painting

Beksiński’s surreal landscapes feature distorted human figures in a dark setting that is both familiar and alien. The strangeness comes from the contrast between the familiar human forms and the strange elements, creating a sense of unease. The muted color palette and ambiguous setting confuse the viewer by making it difficult to distinguish between reality and fantasy. The work succeeds in making the human forms and the landscape appear in both familiar and strange ways.

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3. Sophia the Humanoid Robot

Sophia, an AI-powered humanoid robot from Hanson Robotics, is an example of the uncanny valley effect. Her incredibly realistic humanoid appearance, combined with her ability to express emotions, recognize faces, and communicate, makes for an extremely unsettling experience. With her near-perfect mimicry of self-awareness, yet still falling short of being fully human, Sophia becomes uncanny by being disturbingly close to us, but not quite one of us.

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4. Hiroshi Ishiguro’s Geminoid Robots (2000s) - Robotics

Ishiguro’s Geminoid robots are designed to closely resemble humans, but their mechanical movements and imperfections create an uncanny effect. The robots’ lifelike appearance combined with their artificial behavior evokes a sense of unease and dread, bringing the robot to a point where it feels almost human. This example illustrates how technology can amplify the uncanny through surreal yet flawed imagery.

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5. Tetsuya Ishida, A man who has lost the ability to fly (1996) - Painting
Ishida’s paintings depict a man with a human face but an odd body in a mechanical setting. The strangeness is created by the juxtaposition of the lifeless human face and the robotic form. The sharp contrast between the surreal subject and the everyday scene adds to the strangeness of these works.

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7. Junji Ito, Uzumaki (1998) - Manga
Ito's horror manga has spiral loops that distort the human body and the environment in familiar contexts. The mystery is triggered by transforming everyday objects and people into strange, spiral-obsessed forms that create a sense of horror, fear. The gradual escalation of the surreal elements in a secular context makes the work extremely frightening.

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6. The Uncanny Valley in Polar Express (2004) - Animation
The animated movie Polar Express uses motion-capture techniques to create hyper-realistic animated humans. However, their movements and feelings are a bit robotic, which triggers the uncanny valley effect. That eerie feeling, which is never articulated, arises from such characters’ appearance, which is too human-like and yet lacks human essence. This shows that the dispositional systems of humans in real life and detail, and even the smallest differences, can evoke an eerie feeling.

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8. Silent Hill 2 (2001) - Video Game
Taking the city's foggy, deserted, and distorted creatures as its setting, the game evokes strangeness by combining familiar urban landscapes with surreal elements. Sound design, with the dazzling noise that leads to insecurity. The ability to make familiar things scary in the game creates a strange and lasting effect.

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9. Patricia Piccinini, The Young Family (2002) - Sculpture

Piccinini’s surreal sculpture depicts a hybrid creature with human-animal features, which overall looks like a family. The strangeness comes from the mix of familiar images of mothers in an exotic form, creating a sense of unease for the viewer. The lifelike texture of the artwork and the ambiguous meaning of the strange creatures add to the unsettling effect.

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10. Ryoji Ikeda, Test Pattern (2008) -Audiovisual Installation
Ikeda’s installation uses rapid, flickering data patterns and intense, glitchy sounds to transform familiar digital interfaces into overwhelming, alien experiences. The uncanny emerges from the recognizable structure of binary code being presented in a disorienting, almost aggressive manner. The multisensory assault challenges perceptions of digital technology, evoking both fascination and discomfort.

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Ryoji Ikeda: Test Pattern 100m Version at Ruhrtriennale 2013

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To me, the uncanny is the unsettling feeling that occurs when something is almost real, but not quite. It is the discomfort we feel when familiar objects, such as dolls, human-like robots, or even childhood memories, become strangely unfamiliar. The uncanny often blends attraction and fear, making us stare even when we want to look away. This emotional tension arises when our senses and expectations are confused. I chose the uncanny because it is a powerful way of capturing interest because of its friction, disruption, emotional and intellectual tension arising dynamically.

The first time I experienced something like this was while watching a black-and-white Charlie Chaplin comedy. Though meant to be funny, the characters’ exaggerated movements accompanied by silence made me uncomfortable. Their lack of sound coupled with the stiff acting made them appear to be mechanized instead of living people. I believe that someone who experiences the uncanny deeply is more likely to understand its roots than others. This heightened sensitivity allows them to express fear more powerfully, and even to awaken that same fear in others.

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11. The Caretaker, Everywhere at the End of Time (2016) - Music Album

Early stages of the album sound nostalgic, but over time, the music decays into eerie loops, distortions, and silence. It becomes uncanny as something once comforting turns fragmented and hollow. The work is both emotional and disturbing, evoking memory loss through sound.

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The Caretaker - Everywhere At The End Of Time - Stages 1-6 (Complete)

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12. Charlie Kaufman, Anomalisa (2015) - Stop-motion animation

The film uses puppet animation to tell a deeply human story, but the emotionless faces give a strange feeling. Anomalisa employs stop-motion puppets with hyper-realistic but visibly artificial features, creating a discomforting tension between human and non-human forms, central to the uncanny. Through subtle distortions and multisensory storytelling, Anomalisa is an effective example of how animation can evoke the uncanny, challenging viewers' perceptions of reality and connection.

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Anomalisa TRAILER 1 (2015) - Charlie Kaufman Stop Motion Animated Movie HD